Peter Power (Limerick East, Fianna Fail)

In the limited time available, I want to deal with four issues in the Criminal Justice Bill: the lenient sentencing in sexual offences; gang crime; the law relating to DNA evidence; and anti-social behaviour orders.

The law relating to sentencing in sexual cases is unduly lenient. I have long held the view that there should be much harsher, severe and punitive sentencing for sexual offences. There is growing public alarm over leniency pertaining to sexual offences. I am disappointed that the Bill does not address this issue in a substantive manner. We are all aware of many horrific cases where exceptionally lenient sentences have been handed down for sexual offences. A recent grotesque case, that everyone is aware of, springs to mind, involving a monster, which is the best way to describe him, who went on a spree of sexual offences over a number of decades. He was given unduly lenient sentences in both this jurisdiction and the United Kingdom. I do not wish to give his name for fear of prejudicing any future serious criminal offences which might be brought in connection with his conduct.

That and many other cases underline the fact that we have a serious difficulty with leniency in sexual offences. This Bill, unfortunately, missed the opportunity to deal with that issue. The principle underpinning long-term detention in our prisons is threefold: punishment and retribution in the first instance, the possibility of rehabilitation of the offender in the second and most importantly, the deterrent effect brought about through the imposition of long custodial sentences.

The deterrent effect of long-term sentences is not fully appreciated, especially in so far as this relates to sexual offences. There is a deterrent as regards the offender in that it means that he or she is prevented from offending, obviously, while in prison. Others, too, are deterred from committing these extremely serious offences, I believe. In this regard society has failed women in particular. Women have been subjected to a growth in indecent assaults and serious rape in many cases only to see the offenders receive extremely lenient sentences.

Many citizens, most often young women, sometimes children, have been put through the ordeal of an horrific sexual offence because the offender is not serving a lengthy prison sentence. We ought to confront this, especially as regards premeditated sexual assault and premeditated horrific rape. People who commit premeditated rape or sexual offences should be given exceptionally long and harsh sentences. There should be mandatory sentences of minimum length. While believing in the whole concept of judicial independence, there are far too many cases of lenient sentences being meted out for such cases and the Bill fails in this regard.

I very much welcome section 15 of the Bill, however, which provides for admissibility of certain witness statements. This arose out of a notorious case involving a Limerick criminal. The section provides that where a person is sent forward for trial in relation to an arrestable offence, a relevant statement made by the witness may be admitted as evidence of any fact contained in it if the witness is available for cross-examination but refuses to give evidence or denies making the statement or gives evidence which is inconsistent with it. The Leamy and Keane case in Limerick is a clearcut example of the criminal justice system being fundamentally undermined by a person making a statement to the Garda in an exceptionally serious case — the crime in this case was murder — before withdrawing it for no reasonable or conceivable reason other than to frustrate and pervert the course of justice and the outcome of the case. This was wrong and while many individuals and organisations, including the Law Society, have serious concerns about the provision in section 15 that a judge, in all the circumstances of the case and where justice requires it, may not admit such a statement, I have no difficulty with it, provided appropriate safeguards are introduced. The introduction of discretion for judges is a good safeguard.

I am disappointed the legislation did not deal more comprehensively with DNA related evidence. Although it includes provisions on the taking of sample evidence such as hair and saliva from an offender, I am disappointed the Bill did not go further and provide a statutory basis for establishing a badly needed statutory DNA databank. Technology is available which would not only convict criminals in serious cases, including the sexual crimes I referred to, but would also play an important role in providing potentially exculpatory evidence for defendants.

The Bill's provisions on anti-social behaviour have been the subject of much comment and discussion. While I generally support the approach taken in the legislation, subject to the fine detail being fleshed out, I am under no illusion that it will be a panacea or cure-all for the problems of anti-social behaviour. This is a serious plague on society which is growing at a time when we have virtually unlimited resources to plough into deprived and socially excluded communities to address some of the problems which have affected the nation for many decades. I support anti-social behaviour orders solely on the basis that they may be an effective way of dealing with the symptoms rather than the underlying causes of the problem of anti-social behaviour. I am under no illusions that they will address the causes of this insidious behaviour which are, unfortunately, much more deeply rooted than those suggested by many commentators. I blame the planning and housing policies adopted by local authorities for many years for much of the problem. We are reaping the rewards of careless and negligent planning.

The real cure for anti-social behaviour is for local authorities and communities to come together in conjunction with the Garda Síochána. I am pleased the Garda Síochána Bill lays down a framework within which this can take place. While anti-social behaviour orders have some place in the overall matrix of measures to deal with anti-social behaviour, they constitute only one small piece of the jigsaw. Many gardaí in Limerick have told me that although they would not dream of bringing some offenders to the District Court on the basis of the activities or behaviour in which they are engaged, they would welcome an opportunity to issue them with a yellow card, as it were. Certain anti-social behaviour, when engaged in on a once-off basis, does not merit bringing an offender before the District Court but in circumstances in which an offender persistently engages in behaviour to the detriment of communities and vulnerable and elderly people, it is entirely reasonable that the Garda, at superintendent level, should be entitled to bring him or her before the District Court to be warned that his or her behaviour will come within the realm of the criminal law. That is an entirely reasonable proposition, provided appropriate safeguards are in place and I look forward to dealing in detail with such safeguards on Committee Stage.

Although I generally welcome the legislation, opportunities were missed, particularly with regard to unduly lenient sentencing in sexual cases, an issue on which I hold strong views, and DNA evidence. The Bill offered an opportunity to lay down a statutory framework to establish a DNA database which would be helpful in the fight against crime in the years to come.

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