Judge discharges panel and remands former solicitor on continuing bail until June 20th
The jury in the multimillion-euro theft trial of former solicitor Michael Lynn has been discharged after failing to reach a verdict.
Following more than 12 hours of deliberations in the wake of the 3½ month trial, the Dublin Circuit Criminal Court was told on Wednesday that the panel had been unable to come to a majority verdict.
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Three men have been sent to Mountjoy Prison for trespassing at a former family home which was repossessed by a mortgage company.
A fourth man, Dylan Kavanagh, avoided imprisonment by giving a sworn undertaking to the court that he would obey the orders made by Mr Justice Senan Allen last March.
Ms Justice Emily Egan made orders today committing to prison Dylan’s father, Vincent Kavanagh and two others who had been found this morning at their former home at 36 Beechwood Park in Carlow, in contempt of the earlier orders.
They would at any point be able to purge their contempt by giving an undertaking to obey the March orders, she said.
The judge said she wished it could have been possible to explain the gravity of the orders to the three men, but they had made it clear they did not recognise the authority of the court.
Committal orders are an “absolute last resort”, she said, but the fate of the four men was “entirely” in their hands, and she now had no choice but to commit three of them.
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The president of the District Court has said “a lot” of cases may have to be adjourned and more gardaí may have to attend courts following a High Court decision overturning a rule under which a huge volume of criminal prosecutions were managed by Garda ‘presenters’ there.
The High Court’s Ms Justice Marguerite Bolger held on Tuesday that a District Court rule which permits any garda to present a prosecution in the District Courts is an “impermissible” amendment of section 8.2 of the Garda Síochána Act which limits that “significant” right to the garda who initiated the prosecution.
District Court president, Judge Paul Kelly, told The Irish Times later on Tuesday he is waiting to see how the DPP will respond to the High Court judgment.
He said emergency legislation could “easily” address the situation. He also agreed the DPP has the option to appeal the judgment but said, pending any such appeal, the High Court decision is stating the law.
While it is not entirely clear what impact the High Court decision will have on the District Courts, it may well be that a lot of cases will have to be adjourned and more gardaí will have to attend the courts pending the DPP’s response, he said.
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