The Chief Justice, Mr Liam Hamilton, will today present a report to the Government dealing with allegations of improper judicial and administrative practices in the Philip Sheedy case. It is an unprecedented situation. Public confidence in the judicial system is at risk. And the ability of the Government to deal efficiently with a novel constitutional situation may be tested. There has been an understandable reluctance to rush to judgement in the Sheedy case because of the implications it may hold for our democracy. Senior members of the judiciary and a State official were connected to a series of unorthodox, possibly improper, actions which led to the release from prison of Mr Sheedy, in November, 1998, after serving one year of a four-year sentence. Mr Sheedy returned voluntarily to jail, last month, when the Director of Public Prosecutions, Mr Eamonn Barnes, formally challenged the procedures and practices used to secure his release.
It is an extraordinary case. The deputy leader of Fine Gael, Ms Nora Owen, raised the possibility of impeachment proceedings under a Constitutional provision which states that a judge of the High Court or the Supreme Court may be removed from office for stated misbehaviour or incapacity, on a resolution of both Houses of the Oireachtas. The party's spokesman on justice, Mr Jim Higgins, said a coach and four had been driven through time-honoured procedures in the case. The Labour Party's spokesman, Mr Brendan Howlin, regarded what happened as peculiar and, at worst, sinister. Disturbing questions had been raised as to whether there had been improper interference with the administration of criminal justice by the courts, he said.
The three individuals in the eye of the storm are: Supreme Court Judge, Mr Justice Hugh O'Flaherty, who contacted the County Registrar about the case; the County Registrar, Mr Michael Quinlan, who arranged a listing of the case before the Circuit Criminal Court and Mr Justice Cyril Kelly, who heard the case and suspended sentence, shortly before being promoted to the High Court. Neither the DPP nor the Garda was advised that the case was to be heard and were not represented in Court. Mr Justice Kelly chose not to be represented at the subsequent High Court hearing at which his decision was overturned.
Two months ago, the Attorney General, Mr David Byrne SC, warned the Minister for Justice, Mr John O'Donoghue, about the possibility of "improper practices" in the case. As a result, he instituted an informal, non-criminal investigation into the procedures that had been followed. Parallel investigations were conducted by the President of the Circuit Court, Mr Justice Esmond Smyth, and by the President of the High Court, Mr Justice Fredrick Morris, under the direction of the Chief Justice. All of the information gathered in those exercises was supplied to Mr Justice Hamilton and will form the basis of his report for the Government.
Given the seriousness of the situation and the obvious reluctance of the Government to intrude on the independence of the judiciary, it is to be hoped the report by the Chief Justice will make clear recommendations and draw firm conclusions. This saga has dragged on for long enough. It would be utterly unacceptable if the report were to comprise merely a series of statements from the concerned parties and a drawing of attention to conflicts of evidence. The Chief Justice must detail, in full, what has happened in this case and say what, in his view, should be done about it.