Notice to all pub lawyers: case closed

IN the last week or so, the country has seen unprecedented attention focused on the Wayne O’Donoghue trial. Offices, pubs and living rooms across the nation all became venues for heated debate.

Despite the fact that a criminal trial took place and a jury convicted O’Donoghue, more than a week later the public are still trying the case.

We have suddenly become a nation of amateur solicitors, legal analysts and badge-wielding detectives.

We cite the so-called suppressed evidence, display our uncanny knowledge of the timeline of events and vehemently demand that all our questions be answered.

People who perhaps couldn’t tell you what ‘DPP’ stands for, who don’t know his name or didn’t know the meaning of the term before this case (other than as part of the phrase, ‘a file is being prepared for...’) are now bandying the term about, holding him accountable for what they see as an incredible miscarriage of justice.

Yes, Wayne O’Donoghue committed manslaughter and, yes, the Holohan family are suffering beyond what is imaginable for most of us.

But how many of us have law degrees?

How many of us have any idea what it is we are talking about?

I have my own views on what happened in Midleton, but I recognise that, firstly, I’m not a juror and, secondly, I’m not a member of the legal profession.

I know that in all likelihood the trial was executed fairly and a just outcome achieved. A criminal trial is a strategic manoeuvre.

The best way to achieve the aim of the prosecution - a guilty verdict - is to build a case on indisputable blocks, not questionable ones. One weak brick in the wall might bring the integrity of the entire structure into question.

Logic dictates that you choose your materials carefully and objectively.

Modern Ireland is far from a utopia. The justice system serves to deliver precisely that - justice - which doesn’t always equate with the full revelation of the truth. It’s time we all saw our idealist, naïve views for what they really are. It would be wonderful, and consoling, if sentences were always fair and fitting and nothing was hidden in the shadows, put there by decisions made before or during a trial - but that is not reality.

Majella Holohan has real and ample reason to ask questions of the legal proceedings. We, surely, do not.

It’s time for us to move on collectively with our lives and give the people who are actually involved in this tragic situation the space to do the same.

Catherine Howard

4 Grangeway

Pinecroft

Douglas

Cork