A Supreme Court judge would have declared that Peadar Ó Maicín was entitled to be tried before a jury that could understand evidence in Irish directly, without an interpreter. Hardiman J said he would allow Mr Ó Maicín’s appeal, but grant no relief beyond that declaration.
The judgment, delivered on 27 February 2014, concerned Mr Ó Maicín’s challenge to the rejection of his request for a bilingual jury in a criminal trial. He faced two assault-related charges arising from an alleged incident in the Connemara Gaeltacht and pleaded not guilty. The judgment said each offence carried a maximum sentence of five years.
Mr Ó Maicín argued that he should be able to defend himself in Irish, his first language, before jurors who could understand him without interpretation. The State opposed the request, arguing that a jury competent in Irish could not be provided and that testing prospective jurors’ language skills would conflict with random selection requirements under the Juries Act 1976.
The Circuit Criminal Court had refused the request for a bilingual jury, while directing that the trial judge be bilingual and that evidence be recorded in the language in which it was given. The High Court later dismissed Mr Ó Maicín’s judicial review challenge, finding that jury selection could not be restricted on the basis of linguistic ability and that the court could not compel the Minister for Justice to create a separate jury district.
Hardiman J disagreed with that reasoning. He cited uncontradicted evidence that a jury drawn from a district covering the South Connemara Gaeltacht could include enough Irish speakers to understand proceedings, and noted that the Minister could divide County Galway into jury districts under the 1976 Act. He also referred to Law Reform Commission material stating that court staff and county registrars identify people unable to communicate in English when assembling juries for English-language trials.
The judge considered that the Irish language’s constitutional status, and the appellant’s circumstances, supported his claim to be understood directly by the jury. He distinguished an earlier case involving a Dublin defendant, where requiring an Irish-speaking jury would have excluded most of the local population.
Hardiman J’s conclusion is his proposed disposition in the judgment supplied. It states that he would allow the appeal and make a declaration, but it does not set out the other judges’ conclusions or an operative final order. It therefore does not establish the Supreme Court’s collective disposition of the appeal.