Judge refuses to stop trial over ‘detestation’ to burglary

SOCIETY’S “detestation” of the crime of burglary has not lessened since times when it attracted the death penalty, a High Court judge said as he refused to stop the trial of an alleged burglar.

Mr Justice John Hedigan said that throughout human civilisation, burglary has been considered “one of the most serious crimes known to law”.

In many societies it attracted the death penalty, “frequently attended by gruesome barbarities,” to demonstrate peoples’ loathing for the violation of the sanctity of their homes.

“More civilised times have moderated the severity of these penalties but society’s detestation of this particular crime has not lessened.”

He was giving judgment rejecting an application by John McDonagh, of Mooney Terrace, Kilcormack, Co Offaly, and St Joseph’s Park, Dunsink Lane, Finglas, Dublin, to halt his trial on charges of burglary in August 1999 when three guns were allegedly stolen from a house.

McDonagh was charged at Bray District Court in May 2000 and subsequently failed to appear and warrants were issued for his arrest.

He was eventually re-arrested in October 2002.

He sought an injunction restraining his continued prosecution because the inordinate delay in execution of the warrants meant there was a risk he would not get a fair trial. He also claimed he would be prejudiced because he could no longer locate a potential witness who would give evidence that he had previously been in the house in question.

Mr Justice Hedigan said that in McDonagh’s case, three guns were allegedly stolen and this placed this particular crime at the “highest level of gravity”.

On the scales of balancing McDonagh’s rights and those of society, his case was “heavily outweighed” by society’s interest in prosecuting this offence and the judge had “no hesitation” in refusing his application.