Ammi Burke’s behaviour during unfair dismissal hearing ‘unprecedented’, says High Court judge

Solicitor Ammi Burke’s behaviour in court during her challenge to the rejection of her unfair dismissal claim was “extraordinarily unusual and unprecedented”, a High Court judge has said.

In a written ruling on Monday explaining her earlier dismissal of Ms Burke’s case, Ms Justice Marguerite Bolger said she was satisfied the court has power, under its inherent jurisdiction, to dismiss a case on grounds of the applicant’s conduct.

A person’s obligation to respect a court and its processes “go hand in hand with their rights to litigate and their rights to fair procedures”, said the judge. Corporate bodies, such as the respondent Workplace Relations Commission (WRC) and notice party law firm Arthur Cox, have the right to a fair hearing too, she added.

Where the court finds an applicant’s conduct is an abuse of process, the court has jurisdiction to dismiss their proceedings, she said. On May 4th, Ms Burke engaged in a “blatant abuse of the court process” that rendered it impossible to continue hearing her case.

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Last May, as the court and lawyers strained to be heard over Ms Burke’s loud chanting, the judge dismissed her challenge to the WRC’s rejection of her claim of unfair dismissal from Arthur Cox.

Ms Burke’s conduct was “undoubtedly an abuse of process”, Ms Justice Bolger said then, adding that she would explain her decision later in a written ruling.

The hearing of Ms Burke’s judicial review came to an abrupt halt during its third day, as Ms Burke repeatedly expressed, in a raised voice, her discontent that Ms Justice Bolger had supplied copies of case law that had been cited in submissions by the WRC and Arthur Cox.

Ms Burke, of Castlebar, Co Mayo, accused the judge of “litigating the case of Arthur Cox and the WRC”.

Arthur Cox’s senior counsel Peter Ward said Ms Burke was deliberately and consciously obstructing the administration of justice. She was showing “precisely the behaviour” the WRC’s adjudication officer was subjected to by Ms Burke and her mother for an entire day during the hearing of her unfair dismissal claim there in April 2022, he added.

The WRC’s senior counsel Catherine Donnelly agreed with Mr Ward’s application for the case to be dismissed.

[ Ammi Burke loses judicial review after talking over judge and counsel ]

In her judgment on Monday, Ms Justice Bolger said the hearing last May was “descending into chaos due to the applicant’s extraordinary behaviour”.

Ms Burke’s “scripted mantra of objections” to a decision that had already been made and her conduct was “devoid of any attempts at persuasion and appeared to be designed solely to collapse the hearing before the court”.

It could not be objectively viewed as having “any other purpose or outcome” and this, said Ms Justice Bolger, “has to be the very definition of an abuse of the court’s process.”

There was “no justification” for Ms Burke’s behaviour, which came against the backdrop of an “escalating pattern” of her refusals to accept earlier decisions of the court.

The court was “compelled” to grant the application by Arthur Cox and the WRC to dismiss her claim. “There was no alternative option identified or available to the court that would have enabled the hearing to continue,” the judge said.

Ms Justice Bolger noted Ms Burke had earlier, during her own submissions, made various “baseless claims” and repeatedly objected to “what she described as interruptions from the court”.

These “interruptions” included the judge’s queries about what document Ms Burke was reading from.

Throughout the hearing the judge had to leave the courtroom due to Ms Burke speaking loudly over her and other lawyers “in spite of frequent requests to her not to do so”. There was also a pattern of refusing to accept the court’s decisions, the judge said.

Ms Burke’s High Court judicial review was brought over a WRC adjudication officer’s rejection of her complaint that she was unfairly dismissed from Arthur Cox in November 2019. The officer said he inquired into her claim but the hearing could not continue due to persistent interruptions from the Burke family.

Ms Burke claimed she had an unblemished record during her time at the law firm from May 2016 until she was fired without warning in November 2019.

Arthur Cox denied she was unfairly dismissed, saying she received three months’ pay in lieu of notice and a €70,000 ex gratia payment. The firm accepted reviews of her employment were positive, but certain exchanges she was involved in led to a breakdown of trust and confidence.