The Court of Criminal Appeal allowed David McGoldrick’s appeal against four copyright infringement convictions after finding that errors in the search warrant and the information used to obtain it made both documents misleading, unclear and ambiguous.
The judgment, delivered by Denham J. on 24 June 2005, concerned a search of McGoldrick’s home in Tallaght on 9 August 2002. Gardaí seized video cassettes there. The prosecution alleged that he possessed 30 infringing copies of four films for trade. A jury convicted him on all four counts, and he received concurrent 18-month prison sentences, suspended on conditions for three years.
McGoldrick sought leave to appeal on several grounds, including that the warrant was invalid and that evidence from a solicitor authorised by copyright holders was hearsay. The appeal court addressed the warrant issue and did not consider the other grounds.
The Copyright and Related Rights Act 2000 allowed a District Court judge to issue a search warrant where satisfied on sworn information that there were reasonable grounds to suspect an offence under section 140 had been, or was about to be, committed at premises, and evidence was there. But the application form said the suspected conduct was contrary to section 143, which concerns search warrants rather than creating the offence. It also incorrectly said the warrant was sought under section 140. The warrant itself repeated the reference to section 143 and did not identify the section 140 offence.
The State accepted that the warrant should have referred to a suspected section 140 offence, but argued that the judge’s statement that there were reasonable grounds to suspect infringing goods at the address was operative and that the mistaken statutory reference was a minor defect.
The appeal court disagreed. It found multiple errors in the printed forms, said the documents were unclear, and concluded that the warrant did not accurately state the basis on which it was issued. The court said the question was whether the statutory provisions had been strictly met, not whether the documents made sense on their own terms. It found they had not been.
Treating the application for leave as the hearing of the appeal, the court allowed the appeal on the warrant ground. The judgment does not specify a separate order quashing the convictions or state what further proceedings, if any, followed.