Results 6,601-6,620 of 16,849 for speaker:Dermot Ahern

Seanad: Criminal Justice (Amendment) Bill 2009: Committee and Remaining Stages (14 Jul 2009)

Dermot Ahern: The four amendments proposed to sections 21 and 24 of the Bill appear to be aimed at requiring applications for warrants for re-arrest to be heard by a Circuit Court judge rather than a District Court judge, as has been the law for almost 25 years. No one has ever drawn to my attention any difficulty in having these applications heard by the District Court. I repeat the point I made earlier...

Seanad: Criminal Justice (Amendment) Bill 2009: Committee and Remaining Stages (14 Jul 2009)

Dermot Ahern: In effect, the Senator is objecting to an amendment that was passed in the Lower House. Paragraph (a) amends section 2(2)(b) of the Criminal Justice (Drug Trafficking) Act 1996, which specifies the rank of garda who may authorise the first extension of detention following the expiry of the period authorised at the time of arrest. In the case of the 1996 Act, a period of six hours is...

Seanad: Criminal Justice (Amendment) Bill 2009: Committee and Remaining Stages (14 Jul 2009)

Dermot Ahern: I am aware, from experience, that applications for search warrants should be heard in private. When the Garda authorities apply for such warrants, there is a substantial risk that the intended subject might be alerted to the planned search and might avail of the timelag in order to dispose of evidence. Some District Court judges have recently been refusing to hear applications for search...

Seanad: Criminal Justice (Amendment) Bill 2009: Committee and Remaining Stages (14 Jul 2009)

Dermot Ahern: The Deputy has a point. However, we are endeavouring in this legislation to clarify any confusion that exists in respect of search warrant applications in general. Regardless of whether it pertains to organised gang crime or normal crime, if there is any indication, it is important that these are made in effect ex parte and in private to prevent information from leaking out and in order that...

Seanad: Criminal Justice (Amendment) Bill 2009: Committee and Remaining Stages (14 Jul 2009)

Dermot Ahern: There is not a huge amount at issue between us but the advice I have been given is that this order is essentially one of crime prevention and that it is properly imposed at sentence. The order will arise because a person has been convicted and given a custodial sentence for a very serious criminal offence. Given that the order takes effect immediately on release from prison it is an...

Seanad: Criminal Justice (Amendment) Bill 2009: Committee and Remaining Stages (14 Jul 2009)

Dermot Ahern: I do not want to put it any further other than to say that the strong advice from the Attorney General to us, when this amendment was put down in the Lower House, was that it would be better dealt with on the basis of being a criminal matter.

Seanad: Criminal Justice (Amendment) Bill 2009: Committee and Remaining Stages (14 Jul 2009)

Dermot Ahern: Yes.

Seanad: Criminal Justice (Amendment) Bill 2009: Committee and Remaining Stages (14 Jul 2009)

Dermot Ahern: This is the one we accepted in the Dáil.

Seanad: Criminal Justice (Amendment) Bill 2009: Committee and Remaining Stages (14 Jul 2009)

Dermot Ahern: We accept the making of a scheme.

Seanad: Criminal Justice (Amendment) Bill 2009: Committee and Remaining Stages (14 Jul 2009)

Dermot Ahern: The effect of this amendment would be to remove the circumstances under which the State would establish extra territorial jurisdiction over the offence under section 7 of the Criminal Law Act 1997, namely, the offence of impeding the apprehension or prosecution of another person who has committed an arrestable offence. Besides the inconsistency created by the amendment whereby it only...

Seanad: Criminal Justice (Amendment) Bill 2009: Committee and Remaining Stages (14 Jul 2009)

Dermot Ahern: Before I respond to Senator Regan's amendment I would like to make a number of general remarks on Part 4 of the Bill. It is necessary to clarify some basic issues which will assist in dealing with the amendments. Part 4 is devoted almost exclusively to the detention of suspects under various statutory detention orders in the Offences Against the State Act, the Criminal Justice (Drug...

Seanad: Criminal Justice (Amendment) Bill 2009: Committee and Remaining Stages (14 Jul 2009)

Dermot Ahern: The amendments seek to make it mandatory that all new procedures in the Bill relating to applications to extend the detention period must be heard in the Circuit Court. I am not sure if the Senator appreciates that his amendments would have the effect of splitting jurisdiction in individual cases. The District Court would handle the hearing of the application for the extension of time but...

Seanad: Criminal Justice (Amendment) Bill 2009: Committee and Remaining Stages (14 Jul 2009)

Dermot Ahern: I will make a few comments on the section in general. Attention has been focused on one of its aspects where the provision is to hear information from a garda in the absence of an arrested person and his or her legal representative. It has been alleged that these would be secret hearings and are likely to be unconstitutional, but it is fair to say that this provision is necessary to protect...

Seanad: Criminal Justice (Amendment) Bill 2009: Committee and Remaining Stages (14 Jul 2009)

Dermot Ahern: To answer Senator Bacik on section 30, the initial period is 24 hours, the first extension authorised by a chief superintendent is a further 24 hours and the first extension authorised by a district court or circuit court is 24 hours. Normally the district court follows an application by a superintendent, making a total of 72 hours or three days. The total under section 2 of the Criminal...

Seanad: Criminal Justice (Amendment) Bill 2009: Committee and Remaining Stages (14 Jul 2009)

Dermot Ahern: Senator Regan put it very fairly when he said that to accept this amendment would weaken our objective in this legislation. It is important to reiterate that the decision to introduce this provision was not taken lightly. At the same time, as I said before, it does not constitute a seismic change in terms of the powers already available to the Director of Public Prosecutions. However, it...

Seanad: Criminal Justice (Amendment) Bill 2009: Committee and Remaining Stages (14 Jul 2009)

Dermot Ahern: He informed the Cabinet during our deliberations of all that he was aware of. Fine Gael's Deputy Kieran O'Donnell-----

Seanad: Criminal Justice (Amendment) Bill 2009: Committee and Remaining Stages (14 Jul 2009)

Dermot Ahern: -----confirmed in the Dáil that, as far as he was concerned, there was jury intimidation in Limerick. Members of the Lower House said to me privately and publicly - the latter group includes Deputy Finian McGrath and the Minister of State, Deputy Peter Power - that when their constituents got a jury service summons they were shaking like leaves from fear. They tried to use every trick in...

Seanad: Criminal Justice (Amendment) Bill 2009: Committee and Remaining Stages (14 Jul 2009)

Dermot Ahern: We did not make the decision because of those examples.

Seanad: Criminal Justice (Amendment) Bill 2009: Committee and Remaining Stages (14 Jul 2009)

Dermot Ahern: I agree with Senator Alex White that it does not really matter from where one comes. Equally, however, I resent the implication he offered in his earlier submission to the effect that I put forward the legislation purely and simply because I want myself or the Government to appear strong in respect of this matter. I assure the Senator that I take my job very seriously. I resisted the...

Seanad: Criminal Justice (Amendment) Bill 2009: Committee and Remaining Stages (14 Jul 2009)

Dermot Ahern: Yes.