A FORMER Christian Brother charged with more than 100 counts of indecent assault of 16 children in a national school where he taught almost 40 years ago has lost his Supreme Court bid to stop his trial.
The three-judge court yesterday unanimously rejected the man's appeal against the High Court's refusal to stop his trial before the Circuit Criminal Court.
The man, now in his 60s, was initially charged with 104 charges of indecent assault against 16 former pupils on dates between 1969 and 1972. One of the 16 complainants has since died. The first complaint was made in 1998 and, after a five-year Garda investigation, a file was sent to the DPP in April 2003. The man was charged in January 2005.
Giving the Supreme Court decision, Mrs Justice Susan Denham noted the man had made several complaints, including of delays in making the complaints and prosecuting delay. He also complained the leaking to the media by gardaí of information about the investigation into the complaints made a fair trial impossible.
The High Court had found as a fact that gardaí had leaked some information about the investigation to the media, and Mrs Justice Denham said that was a serious issue. She was satisfied most of the leaked information came from the complainants or people speaking on their behalf in what was a "misguided exercise" on the complainants' behalf.
The key issue was whether the publication of the information several years ago had created a real risk of an unfair trial, she said. She found it had not. However, she added, that finding was no reason to impede any internal inquiry or disciplinary action in the Garda over the matter.
She found there was evidence from his affidavit that the man had suffered pre-trial stress and anxiety due to the publicity. While he had secured bail, he had opted to remain in prison because he feared being "hounded" by the media.
There was no medical evidence supporting the stress claim and this was an important factor as the man had undergone medical care, the judge said. She was satisfied the evidence was not sufficient to stop a criminal trial.
A delay from April 2003 to November 2004 in the office of the DPP in processing the case was, on its face, inexcusable and no explanation for the delay had been offered to the court, Mrs Justice Denham added. However, in all the circumstances, it was not sufficient to warrant stopping the trial.
She dismissed a range of other complaints by the man and ruled there was no real risk of an unfair trial.