Judge has Enoch Burke's family thrown out of court after hiking school trespass fines
Last week, Ms Justice Nessa Cahill heard Enoch Burke (pictured) was back at the school and its grounds in Co Westmeath, posing for selfies with pupils and setting a bad example of his claimed ability to defy judges and court orders. File picture: Stephen Collins/ Collins Dublin
A High Court judge has told Wilsons Hospital School he considers it appropriate that the Board of Management should retain a security company to stop dismissed teacher Enoch Burke from trespassing on school grounds.
Mr Justice David Nolan, who quickly put members of Burke’s family in their place when they attempted to shout over him, told barrister Rosemary Mallon, for the school, he did not think the court should be used to police Burke’s trespassing within the grounds and inside the school.
When he made his ruling in the case, increasing financial fines on Burke, members of Burke’s family, including his father, attempted to shout him down again and he had them thrown out of court by members of the gardaí.
“I know what I would do if someone was trespassing on my property,” Judge Nolan told the school. He said he would have a trespasser dealt with by taking action against them in the civil courts, seizing their assets, if necessary.
He said he was refusing to send him back to prison to further make a martyr of him which was what he wanted.
Instead Judge Nolan, the first High Court judge to take on the Burkes face-to-face in a shouting game that he continuously won by threatening to have gardaí throw them out, increased significant financial fines to be recovered by a receiver already appointed by the court.
On the basis Burke had failed to purge his contempt of court for 169 days, he estimated fines to date to have totalled €235,000. He levelled fines at the figure of €225,000 and directed the receiver to take appropriate steps to collect that sum.
He also increased ongoing daily fines to €2,000 for as long as Burke continued to fail to purge his contempt.
He put the proceedings, in which the school had asked for the further imprisonment of Burke, back until mid-October on the basis that the school would produce written evidence of its intentions or otherwise with regard to the employment of a private security firm.
Ms Mallon said the school had financial difficulties with regard to the employment of a private security company and told the court she would take further instructions from the Board of Management and report back to the court with an affidavit of new proposals.
Last week, Ms Justice Nessa Cahill heard Burke was back at the school and its grounds in Co Westmeath, posing for selfies with pupils and setting a bad example of his claimed ability to defy judges and court orders.
Judge Cahill was told the only time Burke stayed away from the school was when he was in prison and during school holidays. Counsel for the school said Burke had turned up again at the start of the new school term.
Burke was suspended in 2022 and some months afterwards was dismissed. He kept turning up for work at the school in defiance of court orders — for which he has been jailed several times. He is still being paid pending an appeal against his dismissal.
The High court has ruled that the decision of the school to suspend Burke on full pay was a correct one.
