Results 6,701-6,720 of 16,849 for speaker:Dermot Ahern

Criminal Justice (Amendment) Bill 2009: Committee Stage (Resumed) and Remaining Stages (10 Jul 2009)

Dermot Ahern: The Deputy has run a few canards.

Criminal Justice (Amendment) Bill 2009: Committee Stage (Resumed) and Remaining Stages (10 Jul 2009)

Dermot Ahern: It is easy to read for anyone in the legal profession.

Criminal Justice (Amendment) Bill 2009: Committee Stage (Resumed) and Remaining Stages (10 Jul 2009)

Dermot Ahern: I do not accept that matters will be left wide open. The section only relates to expert evidence members or former members of the Garda may provide as to the existence of a gang. Such evidence will not in any way be capable of being taken as an indication that a person before the court is a member of that gang. It will be part of the overall evidence required to prove the existence of a...

Criminal Justice (Amendment) Bill 2009: Committee Stage (Resumed) and Remaining Stages (10 Jul 2009)

Dermot Ahern: I move amendment No. 4a: In page 9, lines 30 and 31, to delete all words from and including "the member" in line 30 down to and including "subsection" in line 31 and substitute "the appropriate expert".

Criminal Justice (Amendment) Bill 2009: Committee Stage (Resumed) and Remaining Stages (10 Jul 2009)

Dermot Ahern: I move amendment No. 5a: In page 9, line 32, to delete "member" and substitute "expert".

Criminal Justice (Amendment) Bill 2009: Committee Stage (Resumed) and Remaining Stages (10 Jul 2009)

Dermot Ahern: I move amendment No. 5b: In page 9, line 35, to delete "member" and substitute "expert".

Criminal Justice (Amendment) Bill 2009: Committee Stage (Resumed) and Remaining Stages (10 Jul 2009)

Dermot Ahern: We need to put all of this in context. I do not suggest there is anyone in the House who does not want to do his or her best to eradicate organised crime from our society. I cannot accept the Deputy's amendment because it cannot stand side by side with what we intend to do. What we are trying to do is to raise the level of seriousness of organised gang crime offences to a similar level as...

Criminal Justice (Amendment) Bill 2009: Committee Stage (Resumed) and Remaining Stages (10 Jul 2009)

Dermot Ahern: It has. It worked in the area of witnesses who had recanted their statements. Their previous statements were accepted by the court. It has worked in a number of other cases also. It has worked and the world has not fallen in. All the hullabaloo predicted at the time by the 200 lawyers did not happen. I hazard a guess the same will be true in this case. This Bill has been criticised...

Criminal Justice (Amendment) Bill 2009: Committee Stage (Resumed) and Remaining Stages (10 Jul 2009)

Dermot Ahern: The issue of alternatives was considered and we received advice from the Garda. However, the alternatives are impractical in a country the size of Ireland because these gangs have tentacles in different parts of the country and that has been proven in some high profile cases. Alternatives related to jury intimidation are not possible because of the size of the country. They work well in...

Criminal Justice (Amendment) Bill 2009: Committee Stage (Resumed) and Remaining Stages (10 Jul 2009)

Dermot Ahern: The Deputy had time last Friday.

Criminal Justice (Amendment) Bill 2009: Committee Stage (Resumed) and Remaining Stages (10 Jul 2009)

Dermot Ahern: The Deputy had five hours last Friday.

Enforcement of Court Orders (Amendment) Bill 2009 [Seanad]: Second Stage (10 Jul 2009)

Dermot Ahern: I move: "That the Bill be now read a Second Time." Notice taken that 20 Members were not present; House counted and 20 Members being present,

Enforcement of Court Orders (Amendment) Bill 2009 [Seanad]: Second Stage (10 Jul 2009)

Dermot Ahern: I thank the House for agreeing to consider this legislation this afternoon. Members will be aware that the need for this short Bill results from the issues raised in the recent High Court judgment in the McCann case in which the applicant successfully challenged the constitutionality of section 6 of the Enforcement of Court Orders Act 1940. The High Court delivered its judgment on 18 June...

Enforcement of Court Orders (Amendment) Bill 2009 [Seanad]: Second Stage (10 Jul 2009)

Dermot Ahern: I am not so sure about the "expert" bit.

Enforcement of Court Orders (Amendment) Bill 2009 [Seanad]: Second Stage (10 Jul 2009)

Dermot Ahern: I thank the Deputies for their comments on this Bill. We all share the same objective, to address a relatively urgent matter. When this judgment was handed down we had some forewarning that it might be negative and the Department made preparations in the event the case went against us. Case law in this area has developed over the years and imprisonment is regarded as a last resort. I wish...

Enforcement of Court Orders (Amendment) Bill 2009 [Seanad]: Second Stage (10 Jul 2009)

Dermot Ahern: Yes. This man and wife were subjected to a very serious assault by their neighbour and the Director of Public Prosecutions decided not to prosecute because he said there was not enough evidence. We took a civil action against the neighbour in which I acted for the couple and succeeded in the Circuit Court in getting judgment against the neighbour for $5,000 and £2,500, which was a lot of...

Criminal Justice (Amendment) Bill 2009: Committee Stage (Resumed) (9 Jul 2009)

Dermot Ahern: The purpose of Amendment No. 2a and those associated with it is to emphasise that the person giving evidence as to the existence of a gang must establish, to the satisfaction of the court, that he or she is an expert. Any garda will not be sufficient. The garda giving evidence must establish that he or she has the appropriate expertise. A garda, "who appears to the court to possess the...

Criminal Justice (Amendment) Bill 2009: Committee Stage (Resumed) (9 Jul 2009)

Dermot Ahern: Were we addressing this matter under the scheduled offences in the Offences Against the State Act and opinion evidence was being given as to the guilt of a particular individual by a chief superintendent, I would agree that there would need to be corroborative evidence. The courts have stated this point umpteen times. After the Shane Geoghegan murder, I asked the Attorney General to...

Criminal Justice (Amendment) Bill 2009: Committee Stage (Resumed) (9 Jul 2009)

Dermot Ahern: 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...

Criminal Justice (Amendment) Bill 2009: Committee Stage (Resumed) (9 Jul 2009)

Dermot Ahern: It has to be said that people did not recognise the court because they were not prepared to give evidence to oppose what the chief superintendent was saying.