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Nullem Crimen Sine Lege

There was a time when the Law Society of Ireland discharged all its functions in the corner of a car park.

The car park is still there (in the Four Courts), but the Law Society of Ireland has moved, to the former Blue Coat school in Blackhall Place (and changed its name). Now, in addition to having its own car park, it has the cachet of looking as though the HQ building (from the 18th century) reflects its history, which it does not.

That’s harmless stuff.

But what about the title to this post? “Nullem crimen sine lege” means “no crime without a law”, which in turn means, in the words of Article 7 of the European Convention on Human Rights,

No one shall be held guilty of any criminal offence on account of any act or omission which did not constitute a criminal offence under national or international law at the time when it was committed

The words of Article 7 are superior, but many lawyers prefer the latin expression, for much the same reasons the Law Society felt the need of a stately home: it projects or suggests the endorsement of history.

As always, these endorsements are of questionable value, in two senses; the endorsement of history may not be an endorsement and the historical costume may look odd on the modern figure.

Why should we care if an expression is in latin? Do we actually want the endorsement of ancient Rome? Consider the first Punic war. The Romans trumpeted their fidelity to their word; they used it to extend their influence through Italy by means of treaties. The Carthaginians occupied most of Sicily. The rest was ruled by a dictator (Hiero) and a small group of crooks that might well have suggested the model of the later Mafia.

The Mafia ran into trouble with the dictator and, finding the Carthaginians lacking in support, invited the Romans to help them. The Romans did, for the purpose of challenging the Carthaginians. Twenty three years of war followed, consequent on the breach by the Romans of their “core value” of adherence to their word. Rome had agreed a treaty of friendship with Carthage, but that counted for nothing when the possibility of taking Sicily was in the offing.

Corrib Gas case update

THE HIGH COURT
Record No: 840P/2005

BETWEEN:


SHELL E & P IRELAND LIMITED

Plaintiff

And

PHILIP MCGRATH, JAMES PHILBIN, WILLIE CORDUFF,
MONICA MULLER, BRID MCGARRY, PETER SWEETMAN

Defendants


And

THE MINISTER FOR COMMUNICATIONS MARINE AND NATURAL RESOURCES, IRELAND AND THE ATTORNEY GENERAL

Defendants to the counterclaim of second and fifth defendants

Update (25th July 2008)

1. The High Court, on the application of the Defendants to the Counterclaim, had ordered the trial of a preliminary issue.
2. The issue was intended to be tried on 29th July 2008.
3. Due to a scheduling clash in the Court calendar the Issue is provisionally fixed for hearing on 18th November 2008.
4. The issue is: “Are the 2nd and 5th Defendants out of time to raise public law issues?”

Identity

The Hollywood police have a perennial problem and must have long ago found the solution. Suppose Cary Grant had got drunk and stabbed his neighbour. Should the police arrest Cary Grant? But that was not his name. His name was Archibald Leach.

Who has committed the crime? Archibald or Cary?

In DPP v Thomas [2006] IEHC the High Court pointed out that, (like Cary Grant), the defendant had chosen to be known by a name other than his real name. Therefore, summonses issued against him in his false name were validly issued and were in time.

What of Kirk Douglas? He changed his name legally to Kirk Douglas, from Issur Danielovitch. (Presumably by deed poll). Has the ground become more certain in his case? Perhaps he does not have a double identity any longer?

In fact, for persons, unlike inanimate things or concepts, double identity is not the usual problem in law; it is the theft of identity. For inanimate things, in law, double identity is common; “public placeâ€?, for instance, may have a different meaning in one piece of legislation compared to another.

Identity is not a simple thing. John Locke is credited with the first formulation of identity, in An Essay Concerning Human Understanding (1689), by reference to consciousness rather than the substance of soul or body.

For him, consciousness was memory. This has practical limitations. What of a person suffering from memory loss? If memory defines consciousness, which defines identity, how can we speak of “a personâ€? as suffering memory loss? (This memory loss is different to the memory loss encountered by the Flood/Mahon Tribunal).

More seriously, he denies that identity is related to the body. A body may change and we accept the person has not. A body may have a particular appearance and not reflect the identity of the person. (“Trading Placesâ€? is based on this idea).

Possibly, identity is not coincidental with the person. A person may have several “identitiesâ€?. Some commentators deny that “identity theftâ€? is possible. In their view, what happens is the deception of a person or persons other than the person whose “identityâ€? was stolen.

Komodo Dragons

The result of the Bar Council Elections is in (or out).

The new Chairman should immediately address two issues. I referred to one previously HERE (depose the Attorney General, for reasons of self-respect, from his “position” as “leader of the Irish Bar”).

The other is urgent. It is the need to campaign to reverse a new rule of the Superior Courts. The Superior Courts Rules committee has introduced the following paragraph into Order 99, Rule 1 of the Rules of the Superior Courts (S.I. 12 of 2008).

(4A) The High Court or the Supreme Court, upon determining any interlocutory application, shall make an award of costs save where it is not possible justly to adjudicate upon liability for costs on the basis of the interlocutory application.”;

The effect of this change is to tie the hands of the High Court or the Supreme Court on the issue of the payment of costs on interlocutory applications. Very often their costs are made “costs in the cause”. This means that the responsibility for the payment of the costs will lie with the unsuccessful litigant. Or, the costs are “reserved”. This means that the issue of responsibility for the payment of such costs will, or may, be determined by the trial judge at the hearing of the action.

The effect of the new rule is to favour wealthy litigants by raising the stakes for litigants who are not wealthy.

It is not enough now to be strategically superior; it is essential to be tactically perfect.

I am reminded of the Komodo Dragon. It has toxic saliva so powerful it needs just to strike and bite sufficient to break the skin of its victim, which, fleeing the attack, is followed by the Dragon at a leisurely pace in the certainty that the victim will succumb to the poison (a biological poison) and be eaten by the Dragon, alive.

Should we not prefer people to monsters?

Democracy and Free Speech

In Ireland, we have difficulty understanding broad concepts, or so it seems.

Currently, the Irish Times (one, at least, of its “opinion columnistsâ€?) and the Sunday Business Post (the editorial) are citing the principle of democracy to accord respect (and, possibly, equality with the Irish referendum verdict) to the “viewsâ€? of other EU member states on the Lisbon Treaty.

The Government itself (the Taoiseach) defends Mr. Sarkozy’s “rightâ€? to express his reaction to the rejection of the Lisbon Treaty by Ireland.

By contrast when Richard Corrigan expressed a criticism about Irish food he was attacked for doing so.

The Lisbon referendum was an exercise in democracy; anything involving the people is that.

Silencing Richard Corrigan is not a denial of democracy, it is a denial of free speech. Accepting Mr. Sarkozy’s right to express his opinion of the referendum result is a failure to defend democracy, not a defence of free speech.

Richard Corrigan is an ordinary person, addressing an ordinary issue; Mr. Sarkozy is not an ordinary person and positively rejects the referendum result.

The Taoiseach, in defending him is defending what he is saying.

The particular criticisms that may be made about the other EU member states in relation to the Lisbon Treaty are not really relevant to the above points, but, it is particularly indefensible to speak of the views of other member states in the context of references to democracy. It is fully acknowledged that the EU member states did not wish to submit the Lisbon Treaty to popular plebiscite and avoided doing so with one single exception.

This would have been beyond criticism, if popular plebiscite had not already been adopted (and came up with the “wrongâ€? result on the EU Constitution). It was, it did, and to reject it or avoid its use is not the fullest commitment to democracy imaginable.

Here in Ireland we are not exposed to “Free Speechâ€? very much.

The most notable recent exception is to be found in the 2006 Annual Report of the Information Commissioner.

She recounts her experience of addressing the Oireachtas Joint Committee on Finance and the Public Service and how she believed that each member subscribed to her views on Section 32 of the Freedom of information Act 1997. When it came to a vote, however, the Committee split on party lines, favouring the Minister over the Information Commissioner. (And in favouring the Minister, disadvantaged the citizens).

To the credit of the Information Commissioner, she declines to give up the fight in the face of power and sets out her views and experiences in her Report.

We need more of this, not least because we will come to learn the difference between Richard Corrigan’s opinions and Mr. Sarkozy’s opinions.

A Judge may (sometimes) look at a cat

Sometimes it is difficult to prove the things that need proof. It is a relief therefore when the judge will “take judicial noticeâ€? of a fact. It means that proof is not required of that fact.

Section 4 of the European Convention on Human Rights Act 2003 reads:

4.—Judicial notice shall be taken of the Convention provisions and of—

(a) any declaration, decision, advisory opinion or judgment of the European Court of Human Rights established under the Convention on any question in respect of which that Court has jurisdiction,

(b) any decision or opinion of the European Commission of Human Rights so established on any question in respect of which it had jurisdiction,

(c) any decision of the Committee of Ministers established under the Statute of the Council of Europe on any question in respect of which it has jurisdiction,

and a court shall, when interpreting and applying the Convention provisions, take due account of the principles laid down by those declarations, decisions, advisory opinions, opinions and judgments.

Hmm. Is there a gap? How should one prove the “…declaration, decision,…â€? etc. of which the judge will take judicial notice? Where is the authoritative copy available? Are all copies authoritative?

Digital Rights Ireland Ltd – Judgment reserved

THE HIGH COURT
2006 No. 3785P

 

Between

 

DIGITAL RIGHTS IRELAND LIMITED

Plaintiff

And

 

THE MINISTER FOR COMMUNICATIONS, MARINE AND NATURAL RESOURCES, THE MINISTER FOR JUSTICE, EQUALITY AND LAW REFORM, THE COMMISSIONER FOR THE GARDA SIOCHANA, IRELAND AND THE ATTORNEY GENERAL

Defendants

UPDATE (16/7/2008)

1. Judge McKechnie has reserved judgment on the remaining issues before the Court.

2.The Plaintiff has asked the Court to refer the issue of the validity of Directive 2006/24/EC to the ECJ. The State had brought this question to the ECJ. (The hearing began in the ECJ the very morning the Motions opened before Judge McKechnie). The Plaintiff endorses the State case but goes further; it says the Directive is not valid, not simply on procedural grounds, but on substantive grounds of breach of human rights and the fundamental law of the EU. This is a very important difference between the State and the Plaintiff on the Directive point.

3. The State had asked the Court to deny locus standi to the Plaintiff and, in default of success on that request, asked that the Court order the Plaintiff to furnish security for costs to the State. Judgement on these points has also been reserved.

4. At time of writing, no reply has been received from Hans-Gert Pottering, the President of the EU Parliament to the letter McGarr Solicitors sent to him.

Tortilla Flat-pack

A plaintiff in Ireland claiming general damages for a deficient holiday is more likely to be successful than a similar plaintiff in the UK. However, the plaintiff in ARTIS v MFI Ltd. [2006] CC (Huddersfield) would not have been anymore successful if he/she had sued in Ireland.

The plaintiff had purchased a flat-pack wardrobe. The wardrobe and its measurements were advertised on the defendant’s website. On purchase and assembly it was discovered the unit did not fit in with the purchaser’s current units. The defendant refunded the cost of the wardrobe but refused to compensate the plaintiff for the time and effort expended on the disappointing wardrobe.

The court agreed and declined to order compensation for the plaintiff under that head. The plaintiff did receive a sum as compensation for loss of earnings referable to the time spent assembling the wardrobe.

(Apologies to students of John Steinbeck for the title to the post)

The Garda Síochána Guide (2)

A well-wisher has directed me to page E-137 of the Garda Síochána Guide, in answer to the query (implied) as to the offence of the Dog Poop Girl, (if any), if she were to feature on the Luas or the DART.

It refers to Section 22 of the Litter Pollution Act 1997 and reads;

22.—(1) Where faeces has been deposited by a dog in any place to which this subsection applies, the person in charge of the dog shall immediately remove the faeces and shall ensure that it is properly disposed of in a suitable sanitary manner.

(2) Subsection (1) applies to a place that is—

( a ) a public road,

( b ) land forming part of a retail shopping centre,

( c ) a school ground, sports ground, playing field or recreational or leisure area,

( d ) a beach,

( e ) the curtilage of a dwelling the occupier of which has not consented to the presence of the dog in the curtilage, or

( f ) such other place as may be prescribed.

(3) Subsection (1) does not apply in respect of—

( a ) a guide dog kept and used for the guidance of a blind person,

( b ) a working dog being used—

(i) for the herding of livestock, or

(ii) by a member of the Garda Síochána or the Customs and Excise service in connection with the official functions of the member, or

( c ) a dog in such other circumstances as may be prescribed.

(4) A person who contravenes subsection (1) shall be guilty of an offence.

Neither the Luas nor the DART are encompassed by 22 (2) (a) or (b) or (c) or (d) or (e);

What of 22 (2) (f)? “Prescribedâ€? means prescribed by the Minister. So, if the Minister has prescribed the Luas and/or the DART under the Section, the Dog Poop Girl will have no complaints under Article 7 (1) of the ECHR as “transposedâ€? into Irish law by Section 3 of the European Convention on Human Rights Act 2003.

What happened?

With regard to the tort of negligence, road traffic accidents are exceptional. They are exceptional because they conceal the fact that, often, the factual cause of an event is not discovered. Even where there is no witness to the immediate event of the road traffic accident, it is regularly possible to infer from the circumstances what happened and the knowledge, experience and skill required to do this is not uncommon.

In other fields of human activity this knowledge is not so easily accessed.

Occasionally, even in road traffic accident cases it is seen how important it is to be able to explain the factual cause of an event. In Counihan v Bus Atha Cliath – Dublin Bus [2005] IEHC 51, the Plaintiffs, pedestrians, were injured when a bus crashed into them. The driver had suffered a blackout. He had no basis for anticipating such an event, from his medical history. Thus, on those facts there was no negligence on the part of the Defendant and the Plaintiffs’ claim failed.

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