Judgment Title: D. -v- DPP Composition of Court: Fennelly J., Macken J., Finnegan J. Judgment by: Finnegan J. Status of Judgment: Approved
Outcome: Dismiss Notes on Memo: Dismiss appeal. Allow part Cross-Appeal. | ||||||||||||||
THE SUPREME COURT JUDICIAL REVIEW
Fennelly J. Macken J. Finnegan J. BETWEEN: D.D.
and THE DIRECTOR OF PUBLIC PROSECUTIONS
Judgment of Mr Justice Finnegan delivered on the 23rd day of July 2008 The appellant was charged with 34 counts as follows:-
11 counts of sexual assault contrary to the Criminal Law (Amendment) Act 1990 5 counts of assault contrary to section 47 of the Offences against the Person Act 1861. On the appeal Count 9 that the appellant did on a date unknown between 1-3-1975 and 31-7-1995 indecently assault one K.S. a male contrary to section 62 of the Offences against the Person Act 1861 Count 10 that the appellant did on a date unknown between 1-3-1975 and 31-7-1975 other than on occasion the subject matter of count 9 indecently assault one K.S. a male contrary to section 62 of the Offences against the Person Act 1861. Count 12 that the appellant did on a date unknown between 23rd August 1975 and 22nd August 1976 indecently assault one J.C. a male contrary to section 62 of the Offences against the Person Act 1861. Count 13 that the appellant did on a date unknown between 1-3-1975 and 31-7-1975 other than on occasion the subject matter of count 12 indecently assault one J.C.a male contrary to section 62 of the Offences against the Person Act 1861 Count 16 that the appellant did on a date unknown between 1-1-1978 and 31-12-1979 other than on occasion the subject matter of count 15 indecently assault one P.H. a male contrary to section 17 of the Offences against the Person Act 1861. Count 17 that the appellant did on a date unknown between 1st September 1977 and 31st December 1979 unlawfully assault one P.H. thereby occasioning him actual bodily harm contrary to section 47 Offences Against the Person Act 1861. On the Cross Appeal Count 3 that the appellant did on a date unknown between 1-3-1971 and 30-11-1976 indecently assault one J.D. a male contrary to section 62 of the Offences against the Person Act 1861. Count 4 that the appellant did on a date unknown between 1-3-1971 and 30-11-1976 other than on occasion the subject matter of count 3 indecently assault one J.D. a male contrary to section 62 of the Offences against the Person Act 1861. Count 5 that the appellant did on a date unknown between 1-1-1973 and 31-12-1979 indecently assault one G.T. a male contrary to section 62 of the Offences against the Person Act 1861. Count 18 that the appellant did on a date unknown between 1-1-1978 and 31-12-1984 indecently assault one J.B. a male contrary to section 62 of the Offences against the Person Act 1861. Count 19 that the appellant did on a date unknown between 1-1-1978 and 31-12-1984 other than occasion the subject matter of count 18, indecently assault one J.B. a male contrary to section 62 of the Offences against the Person Act 1861. The Appeal and the Cross Appeal The same issues arise on both the appeal and the cross appeal namely:- 1. Complainant delay. 2. Prosecutorial delay. 3. Prejudice. 4. Lack of specificity as to time. The appellant submits that on the proper application of the law relevant to each of these issues the further prosecution of the remaining counts against him should be restrained. The respondent on the like basis submits that the remaining counts which he wishes to prosecute should not be restrained. Preliminary Issues. In the High Court the appellant relied on four affidavits sworn by his solicitor. He did not himself swear an affidavit. In many instances the averments by the deponent clearly constitute hearsay being in effect a recitation of instructions given to him by the appellant. Order 40, Rule 4 of the Rules of the Superior Courts provides as follows:-
Accordingly on an application for judicial review affidavits should be confined to such facts as the deponent is able of his own knowledge to prove. The respondent objected to the admission of hearsay on the appeal. However the affidavits were received in the High Court and this was not the subject matter of a ground in the notice of cross appeal and on this basis the court declined to hear argument on this issue. The respondent also sought on the appeal to argue that the delay on the part of the appellant in making the application for leave disentitled him to relief: again this ground was not raised in the notice of cross appeal and the court declined to hear argument in relation to the same. Complainant Delay The judgment and order of the High Court predates the decision of this court in S.H. v Director of Public Prosecutions [2006] 3 IR 575. Counsel for the appellant quite properly conceded that the appeal on the ground of complainant delay could not succeed. Nonetheless complainant delay, it is submitted, is not irrelevant and it was proposed to rely on the delay in what was termed “the omnibus argument” and with which I will deal hereafter. The appellant was born in March 1930 and is now 78 years of age. He has been a member of the Order of Christian Brothers since 1946. At the dates upon which it is alleged he committed the offences with which he is charged he was the director of an industrial school: each of the complainants at the time of the alleged offences was a resident at the industrial school. The date of the offences alleged against each of the six complainants with which the appeal is concerned and the order of the High Court made in respect of each such complainant can be set out in tabular form: Complainant Date of the Order of the
K.S. Between 1st March 1975 and 31st July 1975 (2 counts) Prohibition refused J.C. Between 23rd August 1975 and 22nd August 1976 (2 counts) Prohibition refused P.H. Between 1st January 1978 and 31st December 1979 (2 counts) Prohibition refused J.D. Between 1st March 1971 and 30th November 1976 (2 counts) Prohibition granted G.T. Between 1st January 1973 and 31st December 1979 (1 count) Prohibition granted J.B. Between 1st January 1978 and 31srt December 1984 (2 counts) Prohibition granted Towards the end of 1994 the appellant became aware that serious allegations were being made against him. The first complaint made, that of K.S., was made on the 2nd November 1994. The latest complaint was made in mid-1997. The appellant was charged with the offences alleged to have been committed against G.C. on the 3rd February 1999: he was charged in relation to the other complainants on the 31st October 1997. Prosecutorial Delay On the appeal this ground was restricted to a complaint that the appellant’s trial was adjourned from time to time over a period of one year and nine months on the application of the respondent to enable three applications for judicial review relating to Christian Brothers in the same industrial school to be concluded. Both in the High Court and this court the respondent objected that there was no complaint of prosecutorial delay disclosed in the grounding affidavits and this is indeed correct. However as the learned trial judge did consider submissions in relation to prosecutorial delay this court determined that it should do likewise. At the time of the investigation of the complaints leading to the charges against the appellant there was a wide ranging investigation into alleged physical and sexual abuse at the industrial school. I am satisfied that in these circumstances it was reasonable to seek to adjourn the appellant’s trial pending resolution of judicial review applications taken by other Christian Brothers against whom complaints were made. The appellant has not satisfied me that the period of one year and nine months delay upon which he relies amounts to culpable prosecutorial delay. I would dismiss the appeal on this ground. Actual Prejudice On behalf of the appellant it was submitted that his defence has been prejudiced by reason of the delay in the institution of the criminal proceedings as follows:- 1. The appellant’s recollection of events is no longer clear and had the complaints been made earlier he might have been able to collate or call evidence to refute the allegations made against him. 2. Several potential witnesses are now deceased. Had complaints been made immediately after the alleged incidents these witnesses might have been available to corroborate the appellant’s account of the events. 3. The night watchman R.D. died on the 16th March 1996. K.S. alleges that following a complaint from R.D. he was sent to the appellant for punishment and an alleged offence took place. P.H. alleges that he was abused at night by the appellant and that he then went out of the room and broke a window in the corridor. P.D. might have remembered making a complaint about K.S. Further it is reasonable that the broken window would have been recorded in P.D.’s records: his records were burned or lost in 1995. 4. E.M. was the tailor attached to the industrial school until shortly before his death in the early 1980s. K.S. alleges that an offence was committed one Saturday when he was taken by the appellant to the tailor’s room. As it was a Saturday the tailor was not there. J.D. alleges that the appellant used to fondle him in the tailor’s room while measuring him for clothes three or four times a year. E.M. could have given evidence as to whether or not the brothers had access to the tailor’s room. 5. A.G. who worked in the kitchens died in the late 1970s. Evidence which she might have been in a position to give is relevant to an offence against K.S. which is not now being prosecuted. 6. Several parts of the old buildings of the industrial school have been demolished. P.H. alleges that an offence was committed against him by the appellant in Rope Hall which has since been demolished. J.B. alleges that the appellant committed an offence against him in the sweet shop which has since been demolished.
In relation to the evidence which each of the missing witnesses R.D., E.M. and A.G. might have been in a position to give the appellant has not gone as far as he can go. The nature of the offences in issue here is that they occur in private and in secret. Any evidence which the deceased witnesses could have given would at best have been peripheral. In B.J. v Director of Public Prosecutions, unreported, Supreme Court, 1st May 2007, Denham J. said:-
The applicant has not engaged with the circumstances of the case in that he has not indicated whether any of the evidence which the three deceased witnesses would give is available from some other source. In a case such as the present where the community of the Christian Brothers was presumably numerous and the residents of the industrial school ever more numerous, the appellant ought at least to have recounted his efforts to obtain such evidence as he might wish to adduce from other sources. With regard to the buildings which have been demolished the applicant submits that it is no longer possible to ascertain whether the layout of these buildings would have permitted of the types of abuse alleged. The applicant himself can describe the layout of the buildings. No evidence is before the court as to attempts to obtain other witnesses who could give that evidence. Again the applicant has failed to engage with the evidence actually available to make any risk apparent. I would dismiss the appeal on this ground. Lack of Specificity as to Time A feature common to the three complainants in respect of whose complaints prohibition was granted is a lack of specificity in relation to the dates at which the offences are alleged to have been committed. In the case of J.D. two counts are alleged to have been committed between the 1st March 1971 and the 30th November 1976, in the case of G.T. one offence between the 1st January 1973 and the 31st December 1979 and in the case of J.B. two offences between the 1st January 1978 and the 31st December 1984. The periods span five years and eight months, seven years and seven years respectively. In respect of the three complainants in respect of whom prohibition was refused the period in respect of K.S. is five months, in respect of J.C. twelve months and in respect of P.H. in respect of the charge of indecent assault, two years and in respect of the charge of assault contrary to section 47 of the Offences Against the Person Act 1861 three years. The Criminal Justice (Administration) Act 1924, section 4 provides as follows:-
(5) The forms set out in the appendix to these rules or forms conforming thereto as nearly as may be shall be used in cases to which they are applicable, and in other cases forms to the like effect or conforming thereto as nearly as may be shall be used, the statement of the offence and the particulars of offence being varied according to the circumstances in each case. The rules appended to the Act give forms of indictment for offences. In each case the particulars of offence provide for the furnishing of the date on which the offence was committed. However it may not be possible to specify a date and it is permissible to specify two dates between which the offence was committed. An offence of embezzlement over a protracted period is an example of where a specific date cannot be assigned to the offence and it is appropriate in the particulars to state that the offence was committed between two dates. In Director of Public Prosecutions v F., unreported, Supreme Court, 24th February 1994 on a Case Stated the Supreme Court considered inter alia the following question:- “Whether the circumstances in which the counts relate to an offence on a date or dates unknown in a particular year is such as to deprive the accused of a fair trial in due course of law.” The accused was charged with nine counts of indecent assault each stated to have been committed between the 1st January in a particular year and the 1st January in the year following. The question was considered in conjunction with a further question relating to delay between the date of complaint and the preferment of charges and the judgment does not appear to have addressed this specific question. However in dealing with a question on duplicity the court considered that the manner in which the charges were framed had a large element of unreality. One complainant claimed that the offences occurred roughly every day or every second day and the other that the offences occurred twice a week. In these circumstances the court thought it preferable that the indictment should conform with the allegations which had been made and an approach to realism could be achieved by increasing the number of counts so that each count referred to a period of one month rather than a year. These observations refer to the particular circumstances of that case. In O’R v Director of Public Prosecutions [1997] 2 IR 273 the applicant was charged with ninety offences involving unlawful carnal knowledge, indecent assault and sexual assault on ten complainants between the 1st January 1976 and the 31st December 1992. Charges 1 to 68 and 81 to 90 inclusive were alleged to have been committed between the years 1976 and 1984 and the remaining charges to have been committed between 1991 and 1992. In respect of the complainant C.B. there were twelve charges alleged to have been committed between 1st January 1976 and 31st December 1978 and sixteen between the 1st January 1976 and the 31st December 1979. In the case of the complainant D.M. there were twenty four charges alleged to have been committed between the 1st January 1978 and 31st December 1983. The applicant contended that he was prejudiced by reason of the lack of specificity in regard to the dates of the offences charged against him and relied upon the judgment of the Supreme Court in D.P.P. v F. The learned trial judge dealt with this issue as follows:-
In J.O’C v the Director of Public Prosecutions [2000] 3 I.R. 478 the applicant was charged with sixteen counts of indecent assault over a period of time between the 20th October 1974 and 19th October 1978, the complainant being a girl then aged between ten and thirteen years of age. The complainant’s statement was to the effect that the applicant started to molest her when she was nine to ten years of age and that this continued until she was fourteen or fifteen years of age. In total she was sexually assaulted between 1974 and 1979 or 1980 some forty or fifty times. Again while it is not clear from the judgment I think it likely that the applicant was charged with a number of offences in each of the years from 20th October 1974 to 19th October 1978. Keane C.J. dealt with specificity in the following terms:-
Hardiman J. in that case dealt with lack of specificity as follows. The applicant’s case was that he was prejudiced by lack of specificity in the context of a very long lapse of time which has taken place since the alleged commission of the offences: he is unable to correlate his movements and other matters sufficiently to give his solicitors specific instructions with which he might hope to conduct the defence. The respondent’s case is that the book of evidence contains the evidence against the applicant “with as much specificity as is available given the nature of the offences charged”: the lack of precision complained of was not such as to make it impossible for the applicant to defend himself. However basing his judgment on other grounds he did not further deal with lack of specificity. A ground of appeal in Director of Public Prosecutions v Christopher O’Connor, Court of Criminal Appeal, 29th July 2002, was that the dates set out in the indictment were too vague and unspecific. Fennelly J. dealt with this argument as follows:-
Where specificity was raised by an applicant and offences were alleged to have been committed between two dates one year or two years apart lack of specificity has not resulted in the trial being prohibited. This consistent approach is appropriate in this case: I would dismiss the appeal on this ground in relation to counts 9, 10, 12, 13, 16 and 17. In the present case the time span in relation to complainant J.D. there are two counts alleged to have been committed between the 1st March 1971 and the 30th November 1976, in the case of the complainant G.T. one count is alleged to have been committed between the 1st January 1973 and the 31st December 1979 and in the case of complainant E.B. two counts are alleged to have been committed between the 1st January 1978 and the 31st December 1984. In relation to J.D. his statement is that while he was a resident in the Industrial School from the age of eleven he left at the age of sixteen. When he was fourteen or fifteen years old the applicant came to the industrial school. The last alleged offence was committed against him three weeks before he left. It is clear accordingly that the period in question here spans just two years at most. In the absence of some exceptional circumstance this period is not such as to require a trial to be prohibited. In his statement G.T. complains of a single incident within a time span of seven years. The incident took place on an occasion when he was sick in bed. I am satisfied that the time span in this instance of a single complaint is such that it was open to the trial judge to conclude that it would be unsafe for a trial to proceed. Accordingly it was appropriate that he should grant the Order of Prohibition sought and I would dismiss the cross appeal in relation to this count. In relation to J.B., in his statement he recounts two incidents in the period 1st January 1978 to 31st December 1984. The first incident occurred when he was twelve years of age. He was born on the 15th December 1966 and the date in relation to this incident is sufficiently specific. The second incident occurred later. At the end of 1978 J.B. ran away from the Industrial School for the third time but was returned within a matter of hours. That day he alleges that he was abused by the applicant. Having regard to the statement it is possible to isolate this event to a period around the end of 1978. Accordingly there is not such a lack of specificity in relation to these complaints as would entitle the applicant to have his trial in relation to the same prohibited. I would allow the cross appeal in relation to counts 3, 4, 18 and 19 and dismiss the same in relation to count 5. The Omnibus Argument In J.M. v The Director of Public Prosecutions, unreported, the Supreme Court, 28th July 2004 the applicant sought to have his trial prohibited on grounds of complainant delay, prosecutorial delay and prejudice. McCracken J. held on the facts of the case that the complainant delay was explicable, that the prosecutorial delay was not blameworthy although extensive and that while of itself the delay would not lead to the prohibition of a trial it is a factor to be taken into account in the overall assessment of the fairness of a trial proceeding. In relation to prejudice no specific prejudice had been disclosed. He held that while the overall delay taken by itself was not sufficient to require the trial to be prohibited that delay should be taken into account with other circumstances which he listed:- 1. Inconsistencies in the statements of P.B. 2. The initial statement of P.B. was made after he had talked to J.B. and after J.B. had made statements: both statements referred to the applicant by the wrong name. 3. P.B. did not identify the applicant other than by name, that being the wrong name, the error only being corrected some four years later. 4. Disclosure of the alleged offences to another Brother was not mentioned in any of P.B.’s statements. 5. The identification of the applicant by his proper name came only after P.B. was informed by the investigating Garda that that was the correct name. 6. Nineteen of twenty one charges against the applicant were not proceeded with presumably because the complainant in respect of the same was considered unreliable. P.B. made his original complaint after talking to this apparently unreliable complainant. 7. There was a complete lack of records as to who were pupils in the school at the relevant time. Prohibition was granted. In this case taking the overall delay into account together with the prejudice alleged I am satisfied that on the omnibus argument it would not be unfair to allow the applicant’s trial to proceed. Conclusion Having regard to the foregoing I would dismiss the appeal in relation to the complaints of K.S., J.C. and P.H. I would allow the cross appeal in relation to the complaints of J.D. and J.B. and dismiss the same in relation to the complaint of G.T. The effect of this is that the trial of the applicant should proceed in relation to counts 3, 4, 9, 10, 12, 13, 16, 17, 18 and 19. D.D .v. DPP |