THE GOVERNOR of St Patrick’s Institution for young offenders apologised to a judge in court yesterday for the non-attendance of a young man at the court on an earlier date.
Judge Michael Pattwell had ordered the governor, Hector MacLennan, to appear at Mallow District Court yesterday to explain the non-attendance last week of a defendant being held in custody at St Patrick’s. Michael Cawley, Whitecross Gardens, Moyross, Limerick, is charged with burglary at Costcutter, Limerick Road, on April 28th last.
His cousin, Thomas Cawley, is charged with the same offence and with theft on the same occasion. Neither of the young men were in court yesterday. Mr Cawley was remanded in custody on April 29th to St Patrick’s Institution, Dublin, to appear before Mallow District Court again on May 4th.
However, he failed to turn up in court on that day and Judge Pattwell ordered that the governor appear before him yesterday to explain the circumstances behind the defendant’s non-appearance.
Mr MacLennan apologised to the court yesterday and explained that contact was made between the institution and Mountjoy Garda station to have Mr Cawley conveyed to court. However, due to some breakdown in communication, this did not happen, he said.
He explained that St Patrick’s contacted Mountjoy station when gardaí did not call to collect the prisoner on the morning of May 4th and those contacts continued throughout the morning. Several contacts were also made to Mallow District Court and to Garda Insp Senan Ryan. Mr MacLennan said they only released the prisoner at 5pm that day after they heard his case had been adjourned.
Judge Pattwell told Mr MacLennan he had received that explanation before and was not happy with it. “This is the tip of the iceberg. I have noticed in recent times prisoners coming in from St Pat’s, for example, don’t turn up on time. It seems clear to me your system is flawed. The bottom line is when a warrant is sent out to any of the institutions, it’s the responsibility of the governor to get the prisoner to court.”
The judge said this was an extremely actionable matter as the young defendant had been deprived of his freedom for six or seven hours.
He said it was the taxpayers of the country who would have to pay if the defendant decided to sue the State.
Mr MacLennan assured the judge that if there were shortcomings in the system, he would look into and address them.
