Bail system - Public safety should be top concern

Families of victims of violence are understandably disillusioned and angry with the large number of crimes being committed by people on bail after being charged with serious offences.

Of the 60 violent deaths in 2004, at least 15 or 25% were committed by people on bail. That is a horrifying statistic.

The Advocates for the Victims of Homicide contend that those killings could have been avoided.

Annie Mulveney, the secretary of the group, argues that our bail system is not working.

She has more reason that most people to understand the real horror of the system's failure.

Her 19-year-old son Brian was murdered in 2000 by a man who had been freed on bail after being charged with violent assault.

Brian Willoughby, 24, was later convicted of the killing and sentenced to life in prison.

Willoughby's mother had been pleading with the State to provide treatment for him before he committed the crime.

John Lonergan, the Governor of Mountjoy Prison has described Brian Willoughby as "a madman".

The gardaí objected to bail in his case. He had stabbed two people in separate incidents a couple of years earlier. But rather than provide him with mental treatment, he was put back on the streets until he killed somebody.

Annie Mulveney is convinced that her son would be alive today, if the garda request to keep Willoughby in custody had been granted.

"He needed help as a young boy and, despite his parents' efforts, he did not get it, because the help does not exist in this country," according to Mr Lonergan.

Now the young man will be locked up in jail, until he is released, and society will then have to endure the same risk that he may kill somebody else, unless something is done to rectify his mental disorder.

Another mother may have to endure the same heartache in the future.

Under existing law a judge can refuse to grant bail to an accused depending on a number of factors, such as the seriousness of the offence, the likelihood of the person turning up for trial, and whether the gardaí have objections to bail.

Until recently the only figures available were the overall number of offences committed by people on bail. The latest statistics indicate that such people committed 5,000 offences.

The vast majority of those offences over 75% were theft or burglaries, but there were 242 assaults and 24 sexual assaults.

The homicide rate among bail offenders was only released for the first time last month in the Garda Annual Report.

The fact that people on bail perpetrated a quarter of the violent deaths raises serious questions.

Was this some kind of statistical aberration for that particular year, or does it represent a kind of norm for other years, in which case why was this not recognised before now?

In any event the main issue is that action should be taken to ensure that people charged with serious crimes of violence, should not be allowed back on the streets in blatant disregard for public safety.