The High Court has dismissed Darren Doody’s judicial review challenge to the refusal of enhanced remission, finding that he had not shown the decision to be capricious, arbitrary or unjust. Mr Justice Noonan said the Minister was entitled to withhold the Garda information underlying one of the reasons for the refusal, citing the public interest and the protection of confidential sources and intelligence.
Doody was serving a seven-year sentence, with the final three years suspended, after being convicted of false imprisonment in 2012. He was eligible for the usual one-quarter remission. He sought remission of up to one third under Rule 59 of the Prison Rules, relying on training and courses completed in prison and 43 sessions with the prison psychology service. A psychologist said he had engaged positively in therapeutic work.
The Minister refused the application in October 2014, citing the gravity of the offence and a potential threat to public safety. In affidavits, the decision-maker, an Irish Prison Service official acting with the Minister’s authority, said he had also considered material from prison services and the Gardaí. He said a confidential Garda report did not recommend early release and identified a potential public safety threat. The report was not disclosed to Doody’s legal team, whose request for a copy was refused.
Doody argued that he had not been given a fair opportunity to answer the undisclosed information, and that the offence’s gravity and his previous convictions could not serve as an insurmountable bar to remission. The respondents said the reasons given were sufficient and that disclosure could harm the public interest.
The court accepted that the nature and gravity of the offence and the potential public safety threat were factors expressly permitted by the amended Rule 59. It noted the decision-maker’s evidence that offence gravity was one factor in the balance, rather than a bar to remission. The judge also rejected the argument that completing courses necessarily meant a prisoner had become less likely to reoffend or better able to reintegrate; the Minister could assess whether those outcomes had actually followed.
The judgment addressed the application at the judicial review stage. It did not grant remission or order disclosure of the Garda report. The judge concluded that reasons had been given and that the Minister had explained why the underlying information would not be disclosed. With no evidence of bad faith, the court said it could not intervene. The application was dismissed.