DPP choice of rape charge halts ‘unfair’ trial

THE Supreme Court has halted the trial of a young man on a charge of raping a 16-year-old girl in a van in Wexford town.

The three-judge court ruled yesterday it was “palpably unfair” for the DPP to substitute, without any new evidence, the much more serious rape charge for a previous charge of attempted unlawful carnal knowledge.

The DPP had abandoned the prosecution on the lesser charge after the Supreme Court struck down the relevant law as unconstitutional.