The High Court has refused a woman’s application for relief over a bench warrant issued after she failed to appear at the scheduled time in Blanchardstown District Court on a drink-driving charge.
In a judgment delivered on 20 December 2013, President of the High Court Nicholas Kearns found that the District Judge acted reasonably in issuing the warrant. He also rejected the claim that the judge’s later refusal to cancel it was irrational or disproportionate. The court declined to make any declaration and did not grant the relief sought.
The applicant had been due to appear at 10.30am on 10 January 2013 at the Criminal Courts of Justice. When her case was called, she was not in court. Her counsel asked for a second call, but no explanation for her absence was then given. A Garda applied for a bench warrant, which the judge issued at about 10.45am.
The applicant later arrived and said through her lawyers that she had been outside the courtroom looking for them. At about 12.30pm, counsel asked the judge to cancel the warrant and apologised for the delay. The judge refused; the prosecuting Garda had by then left court. Five days later, the warrant was executed at the applicant’s home. She was admitted to bail without forfeiting her bail money.
The judicial review initially sought orders quashing the warrant and the refusal to cancel it. By the hearing, the warrant had been executed and the applicant sought only a declaration that the refusal to cancel it was unreasonable, irrational or disproportionate. Her counsel argued that the warrant’s presence on the Garda PULSE record could prejudice future bail applications and that her arrest and brief detention could have been avoided.
Kearns said court lists required defendants to attend at the appointed time and that judges were not obliged to delay cases to accommodate late arrivals. He held that the applicant’s absence at 10.30am justified the warrant. Although another judge might have taken a different course on the cancellation request, he found the refusal was not irrational or clearly disproportionate in context. He distinguished an earlier case in which a defendant had been in court at the appointed time but briefly stepped out.
The judgment also addressed the failure to disclose that the warrant had already been executed before judicial review leave was sought. Kearns found no deliberate attempt to mislead the court, but described the omission as serious and the applicant’s and solicitor’s conduct as careless. He said that failure was an additional reason not to grant relief. The court therefore rejected the application, without making the requested declaration or quashing either decision.