DPP: White-collar criminal trials may need expert juries

COMPLEX financial crime trials may have to be heard before a panel of judges or expert juries, the Director of Public Prosecutions has said.

James Hamilton said more white-collar crime files were anticipated and it was therefore “an appropriate time” to consider whether the necessary tools were in place to handle them.

While a jury comprising of members of the general public would have no problem understanding very many white-collar crimes, some financial crimes were very sophisticated, he indicated.

“Where the problem would arise would be if understanding the nature of a fraud that was carried out involved understanding the nature of complex financial instruments,” Mr Hamilton told RTÉ’s The Week in Politics programme. “And there’s a second problem... the idea of asking members of the public to give up perhaps a year of their time to serve on a jury creates a real difficulty.”

In a famous case in Britain in 2005, a fraud trial collapsed after almost two years. A report found the trial’s length had impacted on the careers and personal lives of jurors.

Mr Hamilton said he believed in juries and did not want to see them limited.

“(But) I do think that we may need to take some exceptional measures in the area of financial crimes which might involve, for example, having legislation which would allow for a judge to order that a case be heard before a panel of judges perhaps or before a jury of people with qualifications to understand the issues.”

He said this would likely require a constitutional amendment.

Mr Hamilton also stressed the need for a whistle-blower’s charter.

The Government decided several years ago not to proceed with general whistle-blower’s legislation.