Geoffrey Shannon nominated for district court judge post

Geoffrey Shannon, the Government’s special rapporteur on child protection, has been nominated by the Government for appointment as a district court judge.

Ministers agreed to nominate him at the Cabinet meeting yesterday along with a number of other key judicial appointments.

Mr Shannon was appointed special rapporteur on July 9, 2013, to serve for a period of three years.

The Cabinet also nominated Mr Justice Peter Kelly as the new president of the High Court. He will take over from Mr Justice Nicholas Kearns, who is retiring this month, four months earlier than had been planned. Mr Justice Kelly was previously head of the Commercial Court. He currently sits on the Court of Appeal.

He was called to the Bar in 1973 and spent two years working in the European division of the Department of Justice before beginning work as a barrister. He became a senior counsel in 1986 and was appointed to the High Court in 1996. He was the presiding judge in the Commercial Court from its establishment in 2004 until his appointment to the new Court of Appeal in late 2014.

Other nominationsincluded Miriam O’Regan SC who is being proposed to become a High Court judge.