The High Court has refused to stop the prosecution of M.N. on 18 counts of indecent assault allegedly committed against a young child in 1984 and 1985.
The accused, who was aged 14 at the beginning of the period covered by the charges, sought to prohibit his Circuit Criminal Court trial because of the long delay and the loss of potentially important evidence. He denies the allegations and intends to plead not guilty.
The complainant was about three when the alleged abuse began. Contemporary records show that her parents became aware of allegations in October 1985 and arranged for her to be examined at a sexual assault treatment unit. Video recordings were made of interviews with her but are no longer available.
The defence argued that records from a 1985 case conference supported an inference that Gardaí had also been informed at the time. If established, that would mean the State had known about the allegations for roughly 35 years before the proposed trial. The prosecution maintained that the relevant Garda complaint was instead made by the complainant as an adult in June 2016.
Mr Justice Garrett Simons found the surviving records ambiguous. They showed that a separate allegation involving another child had been reported to Gardaí, but did not establish on the balance of probabilities that this complainant’s allegations had also been reported in 1985.
The judge said the trial court was better placed to investigate that issue and assess what prejudice, if any, arose from the missing videos. The trial judge could also determine whether admissions made by M.N. during a cautioned Garda interview in 2018 were admissible.
The High Court also found the judicial review application had been brought within time because crucial 1985 documentation was only disclosed to the defence in June 2020.
The prohibition application was therefore refused. The judgment stressed that this did not determine whether the eventual trial would be fair; the Circuit Court retained power to stop the case if that became necessary to prevent injustice.