asked the Minister for Justice the circumstances in which an accused, sentenced to six months imprisonment on a plea of guilty at Letterkenny circuit court, County Donegal on the 5th instant, was discharged from custody within hours of his conviction.
Ceisteanna—Questions. Oral Answers. - Discharge of Sentenced Person.
35.
On Friday, 5th July, a man named Bernard J. McManus was sentenced at Letterkenny Circuit Court to six months imprisonment for larceny. Later on that day an application was made to me, by the solicitor in the case, that the execution of the warrant should be deferred pending my consideration of a petition against McManus' removal to Mountjoy Prison pending the hearing of a jury action against another defendant in the same case which had been adjourned until the October sessions.
I became aware, also, that Bernard J. McManus had been served with a summons on 27th June to appear at Letterkenny Circuit Court on Thursday, 11th July, as a witness in a criminal case.
In these circumstances and, as the law does not permit of a person being detained in a lock-up provided in a Garda Station for more than 48 hours while awaiting removal to prison on conviction, I decided to accede to the request for a temporary postponement of the execution of the warrant, pending consideration of a petition which was about to be submitted.
I may add that the petition in question was received by me on 8th July and on 9th July it was disallowed and on that date the Garda superintendent and the county registrar were so informed and that the law should take its course.
McManus gave evidence in Letterkenny Circuit Court on 11th July and was then brought to Mountjoy Prison to serve his sentence.
Would the Minister state whether or not he consulted either the trial judge or the Garda authorities before he arrived at his decision to postpone action in this case? Is the Minister further aware that his handling of the case caused such grave public disquiet that the trial judge apparently thought it necessary on a subsequent occasion to call into the witness box both a Garda Superintendent and a prison officer in order to allay the public disquiet which had been aroused in the locality?
I see no reason why there should have been any public disquiet. This power of mine to defer the execution of warrants has been in operation since the foundation of the State and has been exercised time and again by my predecessors and was vigorously defended in this House by Deputy MacEoin when he was Minister for Justice. I do not propose to be stampeded out of the use of this power which is vested in me by the Oireachtas and I will continue to exercise it in appropriate cases until such time as the Oireachtas, and nobody else decides, I should not have this power.
Next question.
What was the charge? How much?
Deputies
Order.
Chair.
£200 worth of wire.
My information is that it was in the neighbourhood of £4,000 worth of copper wire. Deputies cannot laugh this off. The point is that £4,000 worth of copper wire belonging to this State was removed from that store.
The case concerned the larceny of approximately £200 worth of wire, the property, I think, of the Department of Post and Telegraphs.
Is it not rather strange that the Minister seems to be in the position lately in relation to this power of everybody being out of step except himself?
The courts mind their own business.
There seems to be an attempt to stampede me out of exercising this power when I think it should be exercised and I am not going to give in to that attempt.
Everybody is out of step except our boy.
Except when some Deputies want it done.