The High Court has ruled that Catherine Nevin’s murder conviction may be admitted as prima facie evidence in civil proceedings brought by Patrick Nevin and Margaret Lavelle over the estate of her husband, Thomas Nevin. The ruling does not decide whether Nevin committed the murder for the purposes of those proceedings, or determine the plaintiffs’ wider claims.
President of the High Court Kearns delivered judgment on 1 March 2013, following a hearing on a preliminary legal issue: whether the conviction could be admitted in the civil case. The plaintiffs had originally sought, among other remedies, declarations about Nevin’s succession rights and the estate, damages for wrongful death, and an injunction. Those claims remain for later determination.
Thomas Nevin was murdered at Jack White’s Inn, Brittas Bay, on 19 March 1996. He and Catherine Nevin had jointly owned and operated the premises. It was sold in 1997 for £620,000. A jury convicted Catherine Nevin of his murder and of soliciting three people to murder him in April 2000. She received a life sentence for murder; concurrent seven-year sentences were imposed for the other convictions. Her appeal and a later application alleging a miscarriage of justice were unsuccessful. A further application seeking a certificate to appeal to the Supreme Court had been struck out in December 2012; it was re-lodged the day before the civil hearing was due to begin.
The judgment records that the court allowed the preliminary issue to proceed, concluding that an undertaking to take no further steps in the civil action pending the criminal proceedings had been discharged. It cited the passage of time, the completed trial and unsuccessful appeals, as well as the plaintiffs’ right to have their claims heard within a reasonable time. The court also accepted evidence that counsel had agreed the preliminary issue could proceed at an earlier hearing.
The plaintiffs argued that the conviction was admissible as evidence of guilt, but not conclusive proof. Nevin denied involvement and relied on the rule in *Hollington v Hewthorn*, an English decision that treated criminal convictions as inadmissible in later civil proceedings. Kearns rejected that approach, relying principally on the reasoning in the New Zealand case *Jorgensen v News Media* and earlier authorities including *In the Estate of Crippen*.
The court held that the conviction is admissible only as prima facie evidence that Nevin murdered her husband. At the trial of the civil claims, she remains entitled to argue that she did not murder him and should not have been convicted. The judgment did not decide whether the conviction, considered alongside any other evidence, will establish the plaintiffs’ claims.