THE State was given leave in the High Court yesterday to seek to have quashed the orders made by the Special Criminal Court in relation to 16 prisoners.
Mr Edward Comyn SC, for the Minister for Justice and the Attorney General, said the application related to orders made by the Special Criminal Court. He was seeking leave by way of judicial review to seek to have quashed certain orders made by that court.
He said the Special Criminal Court was not properly constituted as one of its members, whose office had been terminated, inadvertently continued to sit as a member of the court after that day The judge was Judge Dominic Lynch.
Mr Comyn said it did mean that these orders were bad orders. He would ask for a preliminary order to bring the judicial review [to have them quashed.
Mr Justice Flood said he would give leave and the various defendants should be notice parties. They were at present in custody.
The 16 defendants are: Mr Patrick Kavanagh; Mr Hugh Wilkinson; Mr Paul Murray; Mr Bernard O'Hagan; Mr Patrick Gerard McCartney; Mr Jeremiah Sheehy; Mr Michael O'Neill; Mr Adam Busby; Mr Nessan Quinlivan; Mr Anthony Duncan; Mr Joseph Kavanagh; Mr Michael Hegarty; Mr Gabriel Cleary; Mr Brian McNally; Mr John Conaty and Mr Michael Cully.