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INTERPRETATION ACT (NORTHERN IRELAND) 1954 - SECT 20

Offences.

20.(1) Where any act or omission constitutes an offence under two or more than
two statutory provisions or under a statutory provision and at common law, the
offender shall be liable to be prosecuted and punished under either or any of
those provisions or at common law, but shall not be liable to be punished
twice for the same offence.

(2) Where an offence under any enactment passed after the commencement of
this Act has been committed by a body corporate the liability of whose members
is limited, then notwithstanding and without prejudice to the liability of
that body, any person who at the time of such commission was a director,
general manager, secretary or other similar officer of that body or was
purporting to act in any such capacity shall, subject to sub-section (3), be
liable to be prosecuted as if he had personally committed that offence and
shall, if on such prosecution it is proved to the satisfaction of the court
that he consented to, or connived at, or did not exercise all such reasonable
diligence as he ought in the circumstances to have exercised to prevent the
offence, having regard to the nature of his functions in that capacity and to
all the circumstances, be liable to the like conviction and punishment as if
he had personally been guilty of that offence.

(3) A person shall not be charged under sub-section (2) [except by or with the
consent of the Attorney-General or the Director of Public Prosecutions for
Northern Ireland].

(4) An enactment creating criminal liability for an act or omission which,
apart from that enactment, would give rise to civil liability shall not
operate to prejudice the civil liability ....

© 1954 Crown Copyright

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