WHEN Judge Miriam Reynolds sentenced the woman at the centre of the Roscommon abuse case to only seven years in prison in January, she said her hands were tied. It was the maximum sentence available under the Punishment of Incest Act, legislation 101 years old that dated back to the reign of King Edward VII.

The Department of Justice vowed the loophole would be closed and new laws introduced to ensure equality of sentencing for female perpetrators.

"Had this been a case of a male person being convicted, a much longer sentence would be allowed," said Reynolds, who died last week. "A man convicted of incest can be jailed up to a maximum of a life sentence."

While it would be easy to see the loophole in incest legislation as mere accident, it forms part of a greater trend where men at times appear to be less than equal in the Irish criminal justice system.

Comparing sentences served by female and male offenders is not always possible, not least because the number of males committed to prison outnumbers females by eight to one.

However, available figures for people serving life sentences in jail show a marked difference in the length of time actually spent behind bars. According to the Irish Prison Service, the most recent figures show that a man handed down a life sentence – almost invariably for murder – will serve at least 17 years in prison. The average is however, slightly higher as there are a number of male 'lifers' in the prison system, many of whom are unlikely ever to be released as they are deemed too dangerous.

By comparison, the average length of time served by females for life sentences between 2001 and 2007 stood at just 11 years. The figures can be difficult to interpret and the figure for women 'lifers' is likely to have increased over the past year as a harder line has been adopted by the Department of Justice towards violent crime.

In 2007, a total of 1,155 women – including failed asylum seekers – were committed to jail. This represented 11.9% of total committals. However, the make-up of the Irish prison system by no means reflected this figure.

In fact, there are just 106 beds at the two female prisons in Ireland, and those two institutions account for just 3% of the 3,500 people that can be accommodated in the Irish prison system.

There are legitimate reasons for this and the type of crime a female is likely to be involved with tends to be less serious, with sentences therefore lower.

In 2007 for instance, 37 men went to jail for killing somebody, convicted of either murder or manslaughter. Only a single female was found guilty of manslaughter.

Violent crime

However, women were frequently– contrary to popular perception – guilty of very violent crime, and 44 were imprisoned for serious assaults, attacking garda officers and other "offences against the person".

None went to jail for sexual offences, however, and the 1,000-plus strong sex offenders' register has only two females – which now includes the woman from the Roscommon case – on its list.

Prison officers said female inmates were routinely granted early release because of chronic overcrowding at the largest female jail in Dublin.

The Dóchas centre at Mountjoy has a bed capacity of just 86 but operates at more than 110% capacity at most times. In 2007, the number of women on what is known as reviewable temporary release stood at 27, or 24% of the female prison population.

By comparison, there were just 126 men on temporary release, the equivalent of 4% of the total male prison population.

One prison officer said: "There has been a pattern of female prisoners being given temporary release and full release far earlier in their sentences.

"Obviously, this has a lot to do with the overcrowding in the Dóchas centre but as bad as that is, you could not compare it to the conditions in the male prison in Mountjoy.

"The numbers simply do not add up. Women are responsible for one in eight crimes but we have only one in 33 beds to house them."

There have been other cases where females involved in the most serious of violent crimes have never even made it as far as jail or have been given, by any standards, lenient sentences.

Shotgun birthday present

In 1995, Norma Cotter shot her husband Gary dead, using a shotgun she had bought as a birthday present just a week earlier. Cotter was found guilty of murder in 1996 but the conviction was quashed and a retrial ordered. In 2003, she instead pleaded guilty to the lesser charge of manslaughter.

It had been suggested that Gary Cotter had been violent towards his wife but no evidence was heard of the purported domestic abuse after the guilty plea was accepted.

Justice Michael Peart sentenced Norma Cotter to three-and-a-half years in jail, saying there were "times when the court's punishment must be tempered with some mercy and compassion".

Cotter, who the court heard had a young son and daughter to look after, walked free from court after having served most of her sentence while awaiting trial.

In October 2004, Dolores O'Neill was found guilty of the manslaughter of her husband Declan who she had beaten to death with a hammer.

She had stabbed him 21 times and hit him with a blunt object 26 times. He was asleep at the time.

O'Neill was given an eight-year jail sentence after claiming her husband was abusive and an alcoholic. The opposite appeared to be the case.

Declan O'Neill's brother Brian refuted the allegations, saying: "What we heard in court was not our brother."

He told the jury: "You have made up your mind from what you heard in court. I will not fault you for your decision. The fault lies with the justice system in this country."

Another brother told how Declan O'Neill had kept a diary of his injuries, which described how his wife had hit him with a bottle, how she had rammed his car, how she phoned him up to 40 times a day, how she had stolen his medication and how she had threatened to throw acid in his face.

The post-mortem had shown he was in good health and there was no evidence of excessive alcohol intake in his liver.

Dermot O'Neill said: "It is the family's view that he lived a life of quiet desperation.

"Regrettably, it was Declan's view that any steps he took were futile and tolerating the abuse was his only option."

By reason of insanity

In another even more complex case, psychiatrist Dr Lynn Gibbs was last year found not guilty by reason of insanity of murdering her own daughter. Gibbs admitted drowning her daughter Ciara in the belief that the 16-year old was suffering from anorexia and destined for a grim death from the eating disorder.

While no one would argue that Gibbs was deeply ill at the time, a victim of a severe form of psychotic depression, other fathers had committed the same crime and suffered no such leniency.

Gibbs was committed to the Central Mental Hospital for treatment and will likely be released from full-time medical care within a matter of years.

Another man, in an almost identical situation, was found guilty of murder and is currently serving a life sentence in prison.

Somalian Yusif Ali Abdi had been severely mentally ill in the months leading up to his crime.

He had been arrested by gardaí after stepping out in front of a patrol van and firmly believed the police were out to get him, tapping his phones and installing CCTV cameras to film him.

In April 2001, he took his young child Nathan from his cot at an apartment in Clane, Co Kildare, and banged his head off a wall three times. Two years later, Ali Abdi was found guilty of murder despite overwhelming evidence that he was a schizophrenic, suffering from severe delusions.

He was also suffering from post-traumatic stress having seen his parents shot dead and having spent five years in a refugee camp in Africa. As he was being led away, Ali Abdi shouted: "This is racism, this is racism."

Perhaps, the charge he should have made was sexism.