The Court of Criminal Appeal has rejected David Patchell’s application for a certificate that would have allowed him to appeal to the Supreme Court over whether he could rely on a later constitutional ruling about search warrants.
The application concerned the court’s February 2013 refusal to let Patchell add a ground to his appeal against conviction. He sought to rely on the Supreme Court’s 2012 decision in *Damache v DPP*, which held that a search warrant affecting a family home could not be issued by a garda involved in the underlying investigation.
Patchell argued that the warrant used when gardaí entered his home and arrested him was affected by that ruling. He said the arrest and detention were unlawful and that statements or admissions he allegedly made in custody should be excluded. Those were arguments he wanted permission to advance; the court was not deciding their merits in this application.
The court said the proposed question did not meet the requirements of section 29 of the Courts of Justice Act 1924, which requires a point of law of exceptional public importance that it is desirable in the public interest for the Supreme Court to determine. It said the issue could be addressed through the normal appeal process, there were no conflicting judgments requiring certification, and the wording of the proposed question had difficulties. The court also said it was not established that the point would decisively affect the eventual outcome.
A separate reason was the defence’s position at trial. The judgment records that the defence did not require the prosecution to prove the lawfulness of Patchell’s arrest or detention, and that this concession was explained to the jury as shortening the trial. The court treated it as a deliberate strategic choice and said Patchell could not later adopt an inconsistent position on appeal.
The application for a certificate was rejected. The underlying appeal against conviction, including a separate ground concerning the trial judge’s directions on duress, was not decided by this ruling. Patchell had been convicted in 2011 of murder and two assault-related offences and sentenced to life imprisonment, with concurrent terms on the other counts.