The Court of Appeal has struck out most of Paul Christopher Meehan's action alleging a long-running campaign of Garda stalking and harassment, but allowed two specific assault claims against named Gardaí to continue.
Mr Justice Allen delivered judgment on March 14, 2025, allowing the State's appeal from a High Court refusal to dismiss the remaining harassment claim.
Meehan alleged that unidentified people had followed, watched and intimidated him over many years and asserted that they were plain-clothes Gardaí or people associated with Gardaí. His material included complaints about people looking at him, following him into shops, sitting near him, using phones nearby and cars appearing in his vicinity.
The Court of Appeal examined the underlying material in detail. It found that, even if many of the events described by Meehan occurred, there was no reasonable basis for believing evidence could emerge showing that the unidentified people were Gardaí or acting with An Garda Síochána.
Allen J said the court's power to strike out a claim as bound to fail must be exercised sparingly. It is not a procedure for deciding weak cases without a trial. However, a claim can be stopped where a central factual assertion is unsupported and there is no reasonable basis for believing supporting evidence could become available.
The court found that threshold met for Meehan's alleged campaign of surveillance and harassment. His proposed further amended claim, which also referred to surveillance by the CIA and subliminal messages from agents of the United States government, did not improve the case.
Two allegations were treated differently. Meehan alleged that named Gardaí assaulted him on February 8 and June 2, 2006. The State's dismissal application had not specifically demonstrated that those pleaded incidents were incapable of succeeding.
The court therefore struck out the action except for those two alleged assaults. The State was given 28 days from perfection of the order to deliver its defence. A provisional order awarded the State 80% of its High Court and appeal costs.