The High Court has left it to a District Court judge to decide whether a man’s detention at Cobh Garda Station became unlawful during a 1 hour and 24 minute delay in preparing a charge sheet after a computer failure.
In a judgment delivered on 18 December 2008, Mr Justice Hanna answered a consultative case stated from Cobh District Court. The case concerned a prosecution alleging that the accused failed to provide a urine specimen to a designated doctor, contrary to section 13(3) of the Road Traffic Act 1994.
The agreed account before the High Court was that the accused was arrested on 7 January 2007 and brought to Cobh Garda Station. After he allegedly refused to provide a sample shortly after midnight, he was detained until 1.25am, when he was charged. The prosecuting garda said a computer breakdown caused the delay and that Garda policy did not permit him to write out the charge sheet by hand. The accused had been released on station bail and later appeared in court.
The accused’s counsel argued that the detention while awaiting a computer-generated charge sheet violated his constitutional rights and tainted the prosecution. The prosecution argued that the delay was reasonable in the circumstances and that the accused’s later appearance in court meant the District Court had jurisdiction.
Justice Hanna said prosecution authorities could choose to proceed by charge sheet or summons. Choosing one procedure did not, by itself, justify criticism. The key question was whether the time taken to charge the accused was unreasonable. If the delay was challenged, the prosecution had to justify it; whether the challenge was made and whether the delay was justified were matters for the District Court judge to decide as findings of fact.
The judge observed that a 1 hour and 24 minute delay caused by a technical fault did not appear unreasonable on its face, provided corrective action was reasonably imminent. He stressed, however, that this was an observation rather than a finding, and that the District Court judge had to determine the issue. He also noted that a detention which began lawfully could become unlawful through unreasonable delay.
The High Court did not decide whether the accused’s detention was unlawful, whether he was lawfully before the District Court, or whether the prosecution should be struck out. Justice Hanna said those questions depended on the District Court judge’s determination of the delay issue. He had noted that the case stated contained no apparent findings on reasonableness, practicality or necessity, and described the facts as a “factual vacuum.”