The High Court has refused a judicial review application by Danielle Flanagan challenging a Circuit Court order that forfeited €15,000 found on her late father, Gerard Grant, to the Exchequer.
Mr Justice McDermott delivered judgment on 19 December 2014. The application sought to quash an order made by Judge Martin Nolan on 16 July 2012 under section 39 of the Criminal Justice Act 1994. The High Court refused the application in full. It did not make a new forfeiture order; the Circuit Court’s order remained in place.
The cash was found in Mr Grant’s underwear when he was searched at Coolock Garda station on 2 February 2006, after an arrest arising from a roadside encounter. Detective Garda Keith Horgan said he suspected the money was connected to a 2005 robbery and false imprisonment case, and retained it for the investigation. It was later held as an exhibit in criminal proceedings.
In July 2011, Inspector Paul Scott took possession of the cash from Garda Mary McArdle, who had been keeping it as an exhibit. The Director of Public Prosecutions then applied to the Circuit Court for forfeiture, arguing that the money represented proceeds of crime. The application cited Mr Grant’s phone contacts with people connected to the robbery, his lack of recorded work history in Ireland and his failure to explain the cash. Those were the DPP’s grounds for seeking forfeiture, not separate findings made in this judicial review judgment.
Ms Flanagan argued that section 39 allowed forfeiture only of cash seized under section 38, and that the original 2006 seizure was under a different statutory power. She also challenged Judge Nolan’s reasons and his refusal to refer a legal question to the Supreme Court.
The High Court held that Mr Horgan had lawfully retained the money as evidence, and that Inspector Scott’s later taking of possession from the exhibits officer constituted a separate, lawful seizure under section 38(1A). The court said that this provision did not require a search or the use of force. It found that the Circuit Court judge’s reasons were clear in the context of the evidence and submissions, and that he was entitled to refuse the case stated application.
The court also noted that Ms Flanagan could have appealed the forfeiture order to the High Court under section 40, by way of a rehearing. It considered that appeal an ample alternative remedy and said it would decline judicial review relief on that basis even if the challenge to the judge’s reasons had succeeded. The application was refused.