The District Court has revoked orders freezing €130,282.43 in a woman’s Bank of Ireland savings account and Credit Union account, ruling that the evidence before it did not establish reasonable grounds for the suspicion required under the money laundering legislation.
Judge Brian O’Shea delivered the judgment in the Dublin Metropolitan District on 30 July 2018. The application was brought under section 19(1) of the Criminal Justice (Money Laundering and Terrorist Financing) Act 2010 to revoke orders made ex parte under section 17(2). The orders allowed lodgements but otherwise restricted transactions. The judgment says the most recent orders were made on 26 July 2018, following earlier iterations.
The woman accepted that an investigation into a person for money laundering or terrorist financing was taking place. The parties agreed that she had to show, on the balance of probabilities, that there were no reasonable grounds to suspect that a transaction on the accounts would assist money laundering or terrorist financing.
She worked as an Executive Officer for the Revenue Commissioners and had five children. Her affidavits detailed sources of money paid into the accounts. The judgment records income from maintenance, children’s allowance, family income supplement and wages, as well as a €10,000 loan to a friend that was repaid and used for home renovations. The detective garda relied on matters including her savings, holidays, car transactions and rent arrears as reasons for suspicion.
The detective garda’s affidavit referred to an investigation of the Kinahan organised crime gang and confidential information. However, the sworn information supporting the account orders was heavily redacted. The court found that the disclosed material did not show a link between the woman or her lifestyle and the alleged criminal conduct. It said it could not assess whether the asserted grounds for suspicion were reasonable because those grounds were redacted, and it could not draw the requested inference without speculating about the withheld material.
The judge considered whether the woman needed to show a change in circumstances since the orders were made. He rejected that approach: a section 19 revocation hearing was not an appeal, and it was the first opportunity for her to present her case. The court concluded that it was sufficient for her to point to the absence of evidence before it supporting the required suspicion.
The application was granted and the orders were revoked. The judgment’s conclusion concerns the evidence available to this court on the revocation application; it does not state that the underlying investigation had ended.