The High Court has declined to impose any further penalty on five people who spent 94 days in prison for contempt after obstructing Shell E & P Ireland Limited’s entry onto lands at Rossport, Co Mayo. The court held that it had jurisdiction to punish serious civil contempt, including by a fine or a fixed prison term, but concluded that no additional penalty was appropriate here.
The judgment, delivered by Finnegan P. on 7 April 2006, followed the discharge of an injunction in September 2005. The injunction had restrained the defendants from interfering with Shell’s entry to a pipeline corridor and deviation limits through lands at Rossport. Shell had undertaken that, pending further ministerial authorisation, its work would be limited to surveying and marking the route and fencing the wayleave limits.
The court had previously committed three defendants and two people who were not parties to the proceedings for contempt of the injunction. They remained in custody for about 94 days, until 30 September 2005. When Shell sought to discharge the injunction because access difficulties had prevented progress and winter work was not possible, the court released them. They were unwilling to purge their contempt or promise to comply with future orders. The judge then heard submissions on whether a separate punishment could follow.
The contemnors’ lawyers argued that civil contempt was primarily coercive, that a further sanction would punish them twice, and that any response had to be proportionate. The judgment reviewed Irish and English decisions and concluded that civil contempt is primarily intended to secure compliance, but serious misconduct can also warrant punishment to uphold the authority of the court. A punitive prison term, if imposed, should be fixed. The court said such punishment should be a last resort and, in litigation concerning private rights, would usually be imposed at the plaintiff’s request, though the court could act on its own motion in appropriate circumstances.
Finnegan P. said the contemnors had made clear they intended to persist in defying the court’s order. He noted claimed consequences set out in Shell’s affidavits, including losses to the company, employment in the area and the local and national economies. Those were matters described in the affidavits, not findings quantified in this judgment.
The judge decided the 94 days in custody, which had been coercive in intent but also had a punitive element, were sufficient. The parties to the case could also face disadvantages in the continuing litigation, including in any future exercise of the court’s discretion. The two non-party contemnors would not face those same disadvantages, but the judge likewise declined to impose a further penalty on them. The judgment said a further injunction and renewed physical obstruction could expose the contemnors to a fixed prison term of appropriate duration.