The Court of Appeal has dismissed William Harty’s appeal against his convictions for criminal damage and endangerment arising from damage to a house in Killaloe, County Kilkenny, in January 2020. The court rejected all eight grounds of appeal. Its judgment concerned conviction; it did not determine a sentence appeal.
Harty was convicted at Wexford Circuit Criminal Court on 14 October 2020 of criminal damage and endangerment. He was sentenced nine days later to an effective four-year custodial term. The prosecution alleged that he drove a car into a wall of the home occupied by his wife and their four children.
The appeal challenged the admission of a 999 call and the wife’s first Garda statement, which she later retracted. At trial, she refused to answer questions and said she had lied in both. The trial judge declared her a hostile witness and admitted her first statement under section 16 of the Criminal Justice Act 2006.
The Court of Appeal held that the 999 call was admissible as a prior statement consistent with her first Garda statement, but not as proof that Harty drove the car. The trial judge had directed the jury not to treat the call as evidence of the truth of that claim. The appeal court also found a proper basis for treating the wife as hostile and upheld the admission of her first statement, concluding that the trial judge had considered the statutory requirements, including voluntariness and reliability.
The other grounds concerned evidence from a detective who saw Harty near the home earlier that night, scene photographs, and an engineer’s evidence about structural damage. The appeal court upheld the trial judge’s decisions to admit them. It said the differences between photographs taken by two Gardaí, and the fact that the scene had not been preserved, could be considered when the jury assessed the evidence. It also held that the extent of the damage was relevant to the endangerment charge, while the engineer’s inspection took place weeks after the incident; the timing could be explored in cross-examination.
Finally, the court upheld the refusal to direct an acquittal on the endangerment count. It said there was evidence which, taken at its highest for the prosecution, could support the charge and was properly left to the jury. The court therefore dismissed the appeal against conviction.