Hutch acquittal unlikely to silence critics of non-jury Special Criminal Court

The acquittal of Gerard Hutch on a charge of the murder of David Byrne is unlikely to silence the critics of the Special Criminal Court (SCC) as a non-jury court which continues to operate under emergency legislation dating back some 50 years.

Several lawyers familiar with the case against Mr Hutch believed, when the trial ended on January 26th, that the prosecution had failed to prove beyond reasonable doubt he was one of two armed men who shot Mr Byrne in the Regency Hotel on February 5th, 2016.

The main reason for that view was the belief that Jonathan Dowdall, the main prosecution witness, was not a credible witness and he had performed badly under intense cross-examination over several days from Brendan Grehan, senior counsel for Hutch, with several inconsistencies and lies exposed in his testimony.

Mr Hutch, who denied the murder charge, had gone all the way to the Supreme Court in a failed effort to get a jury trial instead of one before the SCC. The view among some lawyers was he had a very good chance of being acquitted had he been tried before a jury but there were mixed views about how the SCC would decide the matter.

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[ Gerard Hutch not guilty of the murder of David Byrne at Regency Hotel ]

“Will the system tolerate an acquittal of someone like Gerry Hutch?” one lawyer asked. “That is the question.”

The SCC, in its judgment, stressed from the outset the three men accused before it were entitled to the presumption of innocence and the court could decide the case only on the evidence before it and was not entitled to speculate.

It was very matter of fact about the problems with Dowdall’s evidence as the evidence of an accomplice and as a potential participant in the State’s witness cecurity programme.

It concluded that evidence could not be relied on unless it was corroborated by other evidence.

[ Mary Lou McDonald says that allegations she used Hutch family for money and votes are ‘false’ ]

That other evidence, including audio recordings of conversations between Dowdall and Gerard Hutch while they travelled to Northern Ireland on March 7th as part of efforts to get dissident republicans to mediate the feud between the Hutch and Kinahan crime organisations, did not provide the necessary corroboration to convict Mr Hutch, it decided.

It ruled there was adequate evidence, including CCTV evidence, to safely convict two co-accused on lesser charges.

Some lawyers believe the case may be an indication of increasing reluctance by the courts to base convictions solely on the evidence of accomplices and/or protected witnesses.

While the acquittal of Mr Hutch may encourage those who argue a non-jury court remains necessary to deal with so-called “gangland” offences, it is unlikely to end the persistent calls from national and international human rights organisations for its abolition.