Court of Appeal upheld Conor Metcalfe’s IRA membership conviction

This report is a localnews.ie summary based on public court reporting and records; sources are listed below.

The Court of Appeal upheld Conor Metcalfe’s conviction for membership of an unlawful organisation styling itself the IRA. The court’s judgment was delivered by Birmingham P. on 18 February 2021.

Metcalfe was convicted by the Special Criminal Court on 19 December 2018 after a five-day trial. The charge alleged that he was an IRA member within the State on 24 November 2015. He was sentenced to four and a half years in prison.

The judgment recorded eight grounds of appeal, including challenges to the materiality of unanswered interview questions, the chief superintendent’s belief evidence, claims of privilege and the sentence. The trial court had drawn adverse inferences from Metcalfe’s failure to answer questions it regarded as material.