Oireachtas Joint and Select Committees

Tuesday, 21 May 2024

Joint Committee On Children, Equality, Disability, Integration And Youth

Review of Barnahus Model for Young People who have Experienced Child Sexual Abuse: Discussion

Mr. Justin Kelly:

On the prosecution process, our primary function in An Garda Síochána is to gather the evidence. We will gather the evidence. The interview of the child and how we do that in a child-friendly manner is important in the context of today, but all that evidence that we gather is one part of the evidence. Everything we do we send to the DPP. As for the prosecution of the cases, all of these cases would dealt with at the Circuit Court level. The counsel who is assigned in those type of cases will really be the ones who are driving what type of witnesses they want to call and what expert evidence they want to call. It is not really a matter for us in An Garda Síochána to decide. It will usually be the prosecution team, between the Chief State Solicitor's office, the DPP and, usually, in cases such as this, senior counsel, that will decide on the witnesses they want to call to bring forward the best evidence in the case.

I might turn to Mr. Noonan, if I have missed anything around those issues.

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