The High Court has proposed declaring that a cash forfeiture application was dismissed in its entirety in 2014 and that the Circuit Court has no jurisdiction to state a case to the Court of Appeal in those proceedings.
In a judgment delivered on 25 January 2019, Mr Justice Garrett Simons said the Director of Public Prosecutions (DPP) could not pursue a case stated after the High Court had dismissed the forfeiture application. The judicial review challenge was brought by Gerard Alphonsus Humphreys, Robert Paul Davis and Pacnet Holdings Limited. Anona International Traders Limited, the notice party, supported their application.
The forfeiture application concerned cash seized at Shannon Airport in May 2010, in several currencies and worth about €210,000. The DPP sought forfeiture under the Criminal Justice Act 1994. Three respondents asked the Circuit Court to dismiss the application because Davis had not been served within the statutory two-year period. The Circuit Court refused that motion in March 2013, but the High Court allowed the respondents’ appeal in November 2014.
Justice Simons rejected the DPP’s argument that the 2014 decision applied only to the three parties who brought the dismissal motion, leaving the case alive against Anona International, which was the only party then claiming ownership of the cash. He said the earlier judgment required notice to be served on all necessary parties within the time limit and dismissed the forfeiture application in full. The question of whether Davis was a necessary party had also been raised and decided in that earlier appeal, he said.
The judge said the DPP could not use a case stated to revisit issues resolved by the final High Court decision. Because there were no proceedings pending before the Circuit Court, it lacked jurisdiction to state a case under section 16 of the Courts of Justice Act 1947.
The judgment proposed two forms of relief: a declaration that the forfeiture application had been dismissed in its entirety and that the Circuit Court had no jurisdiction to state a case; and prohibition restraining the DPP from taking further steps to progress the purported case stated. The judge said he would hear counsel on whether any further order was appropriate or necessary. The source records these as proposed orders and does not state that they were subsequently made.