The Supreme Court has stopped the further prosecution of Daniel Braddish for a 1997 Limerick robbery after Gardaí parted with a video recording said to show the crime being committed.
Mr Braddish was arrested on 14 October 1997 after Detective Garda O’Neill viewed surveillance footage from the shop and believed it showed Mr Braddish carrying out the robbery. During his detention, Mr Braddish was alleged to have signed a statement admitting the offence.
He was not charged until 2 July 1998. His solicitor sought the video evidence that day and repeated the request later in writing. In January 1999, the defence was told that the video was no longer available because it had been returned to the shop owners. Garda evidence later stated that this had occurred by mistake sometime between July and December 1998.
A first Circuit Criminal Court trial in March 1999 ended with the jury unable to agree. At a retrial the following month, the judge excluded still images taken from the missing video because the original footage was unavailable. The jury was later discharged after the defence questioned a Garda witness about the loss of the recording.
The High Court subsequently refused to halt a further prosecution, reasoning in part that the prosecution proposed to rely on the alleged confession rather than visual identification.
The Supreme Court disagreed. Hardiman J held that the video was direct evidence with obvious potential both to incriminate and to exculpate. Its importance was not removed simply because prosecutors preferred to rely on an alleged confession.
The court said Gardaí have a duty, so far as necessary and practicable, to seek out and preserve material bearing or potentially bearing on guilt or innocence. That duty applies even where the prosecution does not intend to use the evidence.
The Supreme Court reversed the High Court and restrained any further prosecution of Mr Braddish on the robbery indictment.