The High Court has dismissed a judicial review application challenging the execution of a committal warrant for a five-month prison sentence imposed in 2012. The court did not grant any of the reliefs sought. It listed the case for 16 June 2022 to deal with costs and any ancillary orders.
The applicant had been convicted in Dublin District Court in February 2012 of driving without insurance and driving under the influence of alcohol. He received a €200 fine for the insurance offence and a five-month prison sentence and six-year driving disqualification for the drink-driving offence.
He appealed, but did not attend the Circuit Court hearing listed for 30 July 2012. The appeal was struck out, and the Circuit Court issued a committal order for the prison sentence and a penal warrant relating to the unpaid fine. The applicant said he had moved from Saggart, County Dublin, to Celbridge, County Kildare, in March 2012 and did not receive notice of the appeal hearing. He later moved with his partner to Derry, where he lived in Northern Ireland.
He was arrested in Buncrana, County Donegal, in October 2020 on suspicion of drink driving. Authorities discovered the outstanding warrant and lodged him in Mountjoy Prison. He was later granted bail.
The applicant argued that the long delay and his life and work across the border weighed against enforcing the warrant. He said he had not tried to evade authorities. The respondents also identified factors weighing against the orders he sought.
Justice Charles Meenan applied the approach in the Supreme Court’s 2019 decision in *Finnegan v The Superintendent of Tallaght Garda Station*. That decision says substantial and exceptional factors are generally needed to displace the presumption that a valid sentence should be enforced.
The judge found that the applicant had not shown he made enquiries about the appeal or took steps to have it reinstated after missing the hearing. The court also rejected the distinction he drew between his summary conviction and the indictment conviction in *Finnegan*. It noted that Gardaí had taken steps to execute the warrants, while the applicant had moved outside the jurisdiction after conviction and sentence. The judgment also recorded his earlier drink-driving conviction and his 2020 arrest on suspicion of the same offence, while expressly noting the presumption of innocence.
The court concluded that the applicant was not entitled to the requested relief and dismissed the application. The judgment did not determine costs or any ancillary orders at that hearing.