The Court of Appeal has dismissed Margaret Connors’s appeal against a High Court decision refusing to pause Criminal Assets Bureau proceedings until after her criminal trial.
The appeal concerned a stay of the CAB’s civil claim under section 3 of the Proceeds of Crime Acts 1996 to 2006. Connors had also sought to wait for the outcome of her appeal against the refusal of legal aid for the CAB proceedings. That legal aid appeal was due to be heard on 4 February 2019. At the Court of Appeal, however, her counsel did not pursue the argument that the proceedings should be stayed pending that appeal. The judgment records that the High Court had treated the issue as res judicata because a similar application had previously been refused.
Connors was stopped while driving on the Tallaght bypass on 17 May 2016 and arrested under the Misuse of Drugs Act. No drugs were detected. Officers found her with £13,000 sterling, €8,000 and jewellery valued at €4,000, which were seized under section 7 of the Criminal Law Act 1976. She was later charged with money laundering. Her criminal trial was scheduled to begin in the Dublin Circuit Criminal Court on 27 February 2019, and she had legal aid for that trial.
Connors argued that proceeding with the CAB case first could prejudice her criminal defence, including through findings about the search and seizure or evidence she might give. The CAB argued that she had not established a real risk of prejudice and that civil proceedings should not be delayed without sufficient grounds.
Justice Irvine said the applicable test was whether Connors had established a real risk of prejudice or injustice, not the test from Campus Oil concerning interlocutory injunctions. The court said the burden rested on the person seeking a stay and described the threshold as high. The possible short duration of a delay, or limited prejudice to the CAB, did not lower that threshold.
The High Court had directed that evidence given in the section 3 proceedings could not be admitted in the criminal proceedings. It also directed that the CAB proceedings be heard in camera and imposed reporting restrictions. The judgment noted that section 9(2) separately bars certain affidavits from admission in criminal proceedings, subject to an exception for perjury proceedings.
The Court of Appeal said the criminal trial judge would determine issues such as the lawfulness of the search and admissibility of evidence, and that the criminal charge would have to be proved to the criminal standard. It upheld the High Court’s conclusion that Connors had not identified specific facts establishing a real risk of prejudice. The appeal was dismissed; the court did not determine the underlying CAB claim or the criminal charge.