Dermot Ahern (Louth, Fianna Fail)

I genuinely wanted to move in the direction of opinion evidence as regards membership of a criminal gang but the Attorney General confirmed advice given by a preceding Attorney General stating the difficulty was not just the necessity to have corroborative evidence but also that membership of a gang would be difficult to establish. It was relatively easy to prove membership of a paramilitary organisation but it is not as easy to prove membership of a criminal gang and that is why we dropped this idea. Consequently we had to re-examine the issue of opinion evidence as to membership.

Expert evidence of a garda on the existence of a gang constitutes a new way – the way advised by the Attorney General – of adding to the proofs required to establish that a loose gang, not in any way similar to the Provisional IRA or any other paramilitary organisation that was operating in the State for decades, is operating in a particular geographical area. That is why much of the discussion on opinion evidence, as it is normally known by a lawyer, is not encompassed by this legislation. The legislation refers to the establishment of the fact that there is a gang in existence in a particular area but the person who gives evidence in this regard cannot link it to the guilt, or otherwise, of the accused.

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