Court may join minister for transport to Enoch Burke proceedings

The High Court judge has asked the school’s solicitors to ask Mr Burke to ask him who owns the car that takes the dismissed teacher to the school. If this information is not forthcoming, the minister will be joined to the proceedings.

Enoch Burke (pictured) has not attended at the school since Mr Justice Cregan made orders last month ordering the teacher’s attachment and committal to Mountjoy Prison for contempt. File photo: Brian Lawless/PA

The High Court may consider joining the minister for transport as a party to the long-running dispute between Enoch Burke and Wilson’s Hospital School, in an effort to ascertain the owner of a car used by the dismissed teacher to travel to the school.

Mr Justice Brian Cregan previously directed the sequestration of the car, used by Mr Burke to attend the Co Westmeath school in breach of a court order banning him from the premises. Mr Burke, in correspondence to the court, has said he is not the owner of the car.

Mr Burke has been imprisoned and fined, and faced sequestration of assets over his repeated breaches of the order banning him from the school, made more than three years ago by Mr Justice Alexander Owens.

He has not attended at the school since Mr Justice Cregan made orders last month ordering the teacher’s attachment and committal to Mountjoy Prison for contempt. The judge recently amended the order, stipulating that Enoch Burke only be arrested if he attends within 100 metres of the school.

Mr Burke was formally dismissed from his position at the school in May for gross misconduct. He maintains he was not validly dismissed and continues to seek his reinstatement through the courts.

The school suspended and later dismissed Mr Burke over his conduct towards its then-principal, Niamh McShane, at a school religious event in June 2022.

When he continued to trespass at the school following his suspension, the school sought court orders banning Enoch Burke from the premises.

At a hearing on Thursday, Mr Justice Cregan made directions relating to an earlier sequestration order in respect of a car used by Enoch Burke to travel to Wilson’s Hospital School.

The judge said there was a question around the ownership of the car. He asked the school’s solicitors, Mason, Hayes & Curran, to write to Mr Burke to ask him who the owner of the car is.

The judge said that if this information is not forthcoming, he indicated he would join the minister for transport to the proceedings. The minister has jurisdiction over car registrations, the court heard.

Once the owner of the car is ascertained, a question may arise over whether the owner has allegedly aided and abetted Mr Burke’s contempt of court, the judge noted.

Enoch Burke was not represented at Thursday’s hearing. The case returns in two weeks.