The High Court has refused a judicial review application challenging a drink-driving conviction, despite finding that the District Judge had no jurisdiction to amend the breath-test certificate used in the prosecution.
The applicant sought to quash the District Court’s October 2005 conviction under the Road Traffic Act, along with a €150 fine and a 12-month driving disqualification. He also sought declarations that amending the certificate was unlawful and denied him fair procedures and a fair trial.
The case arose from an alleged offence on 25 July 2005 at Drummartin Link Road, where it meets Kilmacud Road, in County Dublin. The certificate produced after the applicant gave two breath samples named the prosecuting garda, rather than the applicant, as the person who provided them. At the hearing, the prosecution applied to amend it. The applicant’s solicitor objected, arguing that the error went to the root of the evidence and that there was no evidence the samples related exclusively to the applicant. The District Judge amended the certificate and convicted him.
In the High Court, counsel for both the applicant and the Director of Public Prosecutions accepted that the District Judge had no power to alter the certificate. The judge said the governing principle was that a court could not alter evidence of this kind. The parties disagreed, however, about whether the unlawful amendment invalidated the District Court proceedings.
The applicant argued that a conviction reached without jurisdiction should be quashed and that the error was the prosecution’s responsibility. The DPP argued that the certificate’s original error was inconsequential: the applicant knew the offence for which he had been charged and tested, and no prejudice had been claimed. The DPP also argued that the District Judge could have convicted on the unamended certificate. The applicant disputed that suggestion. The High Court did not determine what the District Judge would have decided had the certificate remained unchanged.
The judge distinguished this case from one in which a court lacked jurisdiction to try the accused at all. She found that naming the prosecuting garda instead of the applicant was an obvious, trivial or inconsequential error that could not have confused or misled the applicant or caused prejudice or injustice. She concluded that the certificate error would not have been fatal to the prosecution even without amendment, and that the unlawful amendment therefore did not make the proceedings a nullity.
The court refused the application for judicial review. It did not quash the conviction, fine or disqualification, or grant the requested declarations.