Courts

Enoch Burke released from Mountjoy Prison without purging contempt

Teacher released with students on summer holiday, but judge warned he would return to prison if he went back to school

Enoch Burke leaving court with family members after he was released on Friday. Photograph: Fran Veale

Colm Keena
Fri Jun 28 2024 - 14:58

The controversial schoolteacher Enoch Burke has been released from prison after more than 400 days by the High Court without having purged his contempt.

Mr Justice Mark Sanfey released Mr Burke at the end of an application made in person by the schoolteacher who was jailed for failing to comply with a court order that he stay away from Wilson’s Hospital School in Co Westmeath, where he used to teach.

The judge said that following a review of the situation, and the fact state examinations are now completed and the school is on holidays, he was directing the teacher’s release.

Mr Justice Sanfey said he wanted to make it clear that the order against Mr Burke remained in place and that if he breached the order he expected that the board of the school would make an application for his committal to prison.

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The decision to release Mr Burke came at the end of a two-hour hearing where Mr Justice Sanfey heard an application from Mr Burke, who was accompanied in court by his parents and other members of his family.

At the outset of the hearing the judge warned that anyone who addressed the court when they were not entitled to would be removed and not allowed attend future applications. The hearing then went ahead in an orderly fashion until near the very end, when Mr Justice Sanfey was dealing with some final matters. At this stage Mr Burke’s mother, Martina, made a number of loud comments from the body of the court, saying it was “crooked” and that Mr Justice Sanfey was “a disgrace as a judge.” The judge then finished the sitting and left the courtroom.

In his submission to the court Mr Burke said that the decision by Mr Justice Alexander Owens granting Wilson’s Hospital a permanent injunction restraining him from attending the school should be set aside because it was in breach of his Constitutional rights.

He told the hearing, which was only for the purpose of deciding whether the court had jurisdiction to hear his application, that the High Court had an inherent jurisdiction to overturn a ruling of the same court in exceptional circumstances where a person’s constitutional rights were affected by the judgment.

He said the core issue was that he had been instructed by the principal of his school to address a student with the pronoun “they” and that he thereby affirm “transgenderism” and accept “an anti-Christian belief”. The school had no legal basis for making such a demand, he said, but this issue had not been addressed by Mr Justice Owens. “It is a gutter judgment.”

Alex White SC, for the school, said Mr Burke’s application was “bound to fail.” No appeal had been lodged against Mr Justice Owens judgment, which was made more than a year ago, and Mr Burke’s application was a “proxy appeal” aimed at having one judge set aside the judgment of another.

Mr White quoted from previous rulings of the superior courts about the public policy interest in having finality to cases so that the parties could know where they stand.

During the four-day hearing before Mr Justice Owens, Mr Burke had not advanced his argument over his constitutional rights because he had been excluded from participation in the case due to his disorderly conduct, Mr White said.

Mr Justice Sanfey said he was reserving his decision which he hoped would be ready within a few weeks.

Colm Keena

Colm Keena

Colm Keena is an Irish Times journalist. He was previously legal-affairs correspondent and public-affairs correspondent

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