The High Court dismissed Veronica Lambe’s judicial review proceedings concerning a District Court ruling that proceedings against her were not statute barred.
Lambe sought a declaration that the six-month time limit in section 10(4) of the Petty Sessions (Ireland) Act 1851 applied to a complaint concerning an indictable offence under the Criminal Justice (Theft and Fraud Offences) Act 2001. Her application described the offence as suitable for summary trial after the statutory conditions had been met, and as not being a scheduled offence under the Criminal Justice Act 1951.
She also asked the High Court to quash a District Court order made on 17 May 2005, which had determined that the proceedings were not statute barred. The application sought orders to prevent the District Court judges from dealing further with the case and to restrain the Director of Public Prosecutions from continuing the prosecution or taking further steps.
Mr Justice John MacMenamin said he had delivered judgment the same day in a separate consultative case involving the Director of Public Prosecutions and a minor defendant. He considered the legal principles in that case and Lambe’s judicial review to be the same. For the reasons given in the separate judgment, he dismissed Lambe’s proceedings.
The judgment does not set out those reasons. It records the dismissal of the judicial review application; it does not say that the High Court quashed the District Court’s order or granted the requested prohibitions.