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Laissez- Faire
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rights, freedoms and repression |
news report
 Wednesday May 31, 2006 12:28 by Chris Murray - The Unmanageables
One Administration's approach to the Rights of the Child.
Section 1(1) of the 1935 Criminal Law (Amendment Act), was declared unconstitutional last week in relation to a case wherein a man claimed that at the time of the 'unlawful carnal knowledge' of a minor, of which he was convicted, he believed that she was of age. Yesterday's judgement by Ms justice Mary Laffoy in another case involving a then, 38 year old man and twelve year old girl had no choice but to take this section of the act into account, but to reject the whole section of the act in toto.
Coverage of the Judgement is splashed all over the corporate media this morning. The issue of lack of protections for the child herein, scrape the surface of the failure of this administration through consistent legislative failures which encompass not alone the Dept of Justice, but also the Dept of Education. The administration as a whole with regard to Church /State indemnity, the collapse of the Laffoy Commission and this Latest fiasco which leaves our most vulnerable citizens at risk. The prompting for this piece came as a result of reading the judgement in yesterday's ruling on the Statutory Rape legislation.
Ms Justice Laffoy for many years headed up the Commission to enquire into child Abuse. The commission was investigating
child-abuse in the Church/ State institutions. It was founded under the aegis Of the Dept of Education in 1999. (First mistake, the Dept of Education was being investigated as part of the work of the Commission).
The work of the Commission was halted in 2003 due to the abrupt resignation of Ms Justice Laffoy, citing in her resignation that
* Since its establishment , the commission was never properly
enabled by Government to fulfill satisfactorily the functions conferred on it by the Oireachtas.
*Extra resources sought by the Commission in June 2002 had still not been provided.
*There were serious reports of major tensions between the commission and the Dept of Education over plans to review the way the commission is operating
* there were delays on the part of the Dept of Education in providing documentation relating to industrial schools.
* Serious difficulties were reported in securing the co-operation of some religious orders.
http://irishhealth.com/index.html
wwww.rte.ie/news/2003/0909/laffoy.html
Ms Justice Laffoy is bound by the legislation currently on the Statutes and had no option but to act within the parameters of the Law. The State , meanwhile are attempting to rush through emergency legislation next week at Dail Eireann in order to reduce the effect of this legislation on themselves and not on the Victim.
Ms Justice Laffoy has experienced both the vagaries of state interference in the judicial process in terms of the serious allegations which led to her resignation in September 2003, as well as current difficulties prompted by the 1935 act . The
inability of the Dept of Justice to deal with the issue of statutory
rape in a mature manner which would alleviate the child victim from providing the burden of proof in such cases.
Twelve men are convicted of and serving prison terms for the statutory rape of minors, six of them face along with these charges other serious charges. The law, as it stands, on the basis of this judgement allows for all these convictions to be overturned.
The protection of the Child, therefore in relation to sexual violence is not high on the agenda of this administration, who have generously decided to reconvene the Dail ,if the emergency legislation is drafted during the summer-break.
Unresolved issues re abuse and violence, which have been subject to re-shuffle and media forgetfulness include:
* The Church/State indemnity Scheme.
Presided over by ex-minister for education Dr Michael Woods.
* The report of the commission of enquiry into child-abuse re-established in 2003, after Ms Justice Laffoy's resignation.
*The Dept of Education and it's funding for learning -disabled children.
*The Dept of Justice and the enquiry into the Rossiter death in Garda custody.
* The Dept of Justice and the children who have disappeared as a result of deportation of their parents.
Links for some of the above:
www.childabusecommission.ie/
www.paddydoyle.com/jihad.html
www.unison.ie/irish_independent/stories.php3
archives.tcm.ie/businesspost/2003 (story 481203672 asp)
www.feargalquinn.ie/lead/1310.html
The bottom three relate to the issue of the scheme whereby the Church was allowed a sweetheart deal in relation to compensating victims of physical and sexual abuse in industrial schools and State -run orphanages.
The article was prompted by the failure of this administration to protect its citizens. There has been a catalogue of failure by both the Depts of Education and of Justice to address issues of
violence against children. There has been a failure to protect victims of crime and a lack of leadership and initiative in relation to acknowledging and compensating these victims.
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Comments (15 of 15)
Jump To Comment: 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15There is going to be an impromptu demonstration outside the Dail on Friday at 1 o'clock and possibly other demonstrations throughout the country.
protesting for and against what though? its very easy for these issues to be hijacked by those who are homophobes, misogynists, anti-choice and anti sex education. the sort of people who disrupted mcdowell last week. there are people out there who want the age of consent raised to 18. actually they would ban sex outside of marriage if they could.
Why not attack McDowell? Frankly, the greater the number of organisations that attack him, be they facists or liberals the better. Micheal McDowell spends nearly all his working week verbally attacking others instead of doing his job, the arrogance of the man is astounding and the day the people of Ireland sack his sorry Ass is the day the country frees itself of an ineffectual, time wasting, windbag.
these people were homophobes who were attacking mcdowell for having pro gay policies. would you support the ICP if they attacked mcdowell because they thought he was allowing too many asylum seekers in?
Sometimes the end justifies the means, the man is a menace to Irish society, the only good thing he has achieved of late is in uniting many different organisations and factions in their absolute hatred of him and what he purports to stand for - which seems to change with media opinion as he panders to the lowest common denominator instead of actually dealing with issues.
The failure of the State to protect children from predatory paedophiles is nothing to do with the hard-right of the pro-life movement, which I admit is an interesting spin on a crisis situation. if you would trouble to read the article and the links, you will see that during the life of this adminstration there has been a consistent failure to address the issue of church abuse,and what can only be termed the taboo of child -rape.
When the section of fthe act was declared unconstitutional last week, the issue of definition of statutory rape came into question. Of the twelve cases currently being tested or about to be tested under this appeal. Six men charged with rape of a minor stand to walk free. These are the simple facts. The attempt to tie it in with the resignation of Ms Justice Laffoy (who judged the Mister A case yesterday) was an attempt to qualify the issue in terms of a catalogue of failures by the State to address the issue of child protection , be it in regard to Church/ State indemnity, deportation of Child citizens, human trafficking or the death in custody of a 14 year old boy. The failure of the State with regard to these issues stands as an indictment against both the current Minister for Justice and the two former ministers for education: Minister Noel dempsey TD and Dr Michael Woods TD. The links included in the article provide adequate resources to those who want to research the issue as well as an invitation to add links.
Specially recommended is Paddy Doyle's site.
Since writing this the news has put out a report stating
that the state will today apply for an appeal against Ms Justice Laffoy's ruling, in a special sitting of the court .
The Dail will re-convene on Wednesday of next week to pass emergency legislation. This is simply not good enough. When Laffoy resigned the State took responsibility , when Woods was asked to resign Mary Harney stood by him.
The appeal and the emergency legislation show lack of forethought and considerable lack of care by this administration for the protection of the citizens of this state.
I support the call by the women of Phibsboro for the resignation of the Minister for Justice on the issue.
"The failure of the State to protect children from predatory paedophiles is nothing to do with the hard-right of the pro-life movement, which I admit is an interesting spin on a crisis situation. if you would trouble to read the article and the links,"
If you would trouble to read my comments you would see that I am suggesting that they are likely to take advantage of this situation. I am not spinning, why would I? I am just offering an opinion based on past experience.
They certainly will be opposing any lowering of the age of consent to 16 and especially regarding gays. If you are happy to make common cause with them then thats your decision. I would be extremely wary of attending any such demos.
The Superior General of the Irish Sisters of Charity has said her order would not align itself with other religious orders that have apologised in public for sexual abuse by non-members that took place in their institutions.
www.paddydoyle.com/
this has links to the Fern's Report, the Wood's debacle
and paddy's autobiography.
Mr Justice John Murray has agreed to a special sitting of the court on Friday to hear the State's appeal of the Laffoy decision on the Mr. A. case.
Goes to court tomorrow. The list goes A thru F.
This one is widely identified in the Mainstream media.
Google: Newstalk 106 for the interview with the mother of the now 16 year old girl at the centre of the Mr A case.
He is identified as such to protect the anonymity of his victim.
The State may be prepared to stop tomorrow's hearing until the case is appealed in the Supreme Court on Friday morning. The Justice who has agreed to hear the appeal, Mr John Murray states that the issue may not be handled within the jurisdiction of the Court given that it is a legislative issue. Thus Mr Mc Dowell's advisors have failed again to address the issue , which has been bubbling under since the constitutionality of the
Law was tested last week.
Section 1(1) of the 1935 Act, enacted in 1937 now is rejected in toto by the appeal court, Mr A is not guilty of any crime as the crime does not exsist on the statutes.
I am a Counsellor who daily is one who picks up the pieces of lives destroyed by such devastation as child sex abuse. The total carelessness and disgraceful tardiness of our legislators and government to put in place protection for our children astounds and frightens me. To think paedophiles are now protected and our children are sitting ducks, more vulnerable now due to last week's ruling, than children in child-sex-tourist Thailand, is preposterous. Or are the eejits trying to boost tourism in some wacky way???
I personally have no time for McDowell. I believe he is the worst thing to hit irish politics since the War of Independence. But you cannot blame him for the current crisis. Every TD is responsible. I remember studying this part of law two years ago and thinking to myself that there is no way it would stand up to a constitutional challenge. My lecturer was of the same oppinion. in fact anyone who has studied criminal law could have told you this. The reason the law has never been changed is that no TD was willing to step forward and say that the law is too harsh on men who have sex with underage girls. Why would they? Who would vote for this TD when the public found out? i think it is disgraceful that the opposition are using this situation to their advantage as they are just as responsible.
I also believe that rushing legislation through the Dáil is a stupid idea. There's no way it can be properly thought out. We dont actually need a statutory rape legislation straight away. Why cant they just be prosecuted for ordinary rape? Im pretty sure the state would succeed. And when we do get the statutory rape legislation it cant be constitutional if its retrospective so the people being freed at the moment cant really be prosecuted with it. Thats my understanding anyway.
I hope the government will take this opportunity to reform all the sexual offences legislation as it is very outdated and extremely prejudiced against males, both as offenders and victims.
It is very clear that the law to resolve this issue should be tough. However the judgement, or what we have of it, in the appeal of the Mr. A case raises some very serious consequences.Firstly, I am always suspicious of reserved judgements.it's a bit like saying , well I agree with you but give me time to work out an argument to that effect.
The original suspreme court judgement that allowed the High Court to release Mr. A did so on the basis that the section of the1935 in effect did not exist. One of the reasons given for granting the States appeal is that Mr. A had pleaded guilty. But he pleaded guilty to an offence which effectively did not exist. One cannot plead giulty to something that isn't an offence. Effectivley, the Supreme Court is using a non-existant base upon which to construct the judgement granting the State's appeal.
OK who cares...the fiend is back in jail and that's all that matters. Well,no. Fact is that judgements that put monsters behind bars can be judgements that later adversely affect us in other ways. How?
Well, the reason Mr. A pleaded guilty was so as to recieve a lesser sentence since presumably he knew that the 1935 Act (which he believed existed)provided an absolute liability, i.e., there is no defence. If he could have presented a defence, he may have (although it is hard to see what his excuse could have been); but he wasn't allowed. So it was in his interest ot plead guilty. That raises a question over the value and nature of his plea. It was this plea which was central to the appeal granted to the State.
Here's an analogy. It was in the interests of the Bermingham Six to sign statements admitting guilt in order to stop been abused in custody. These statements were instrumental in jailing them.
The effect of the appeal (one of the effects) will be to give value to statements signed by an accused under duress while in garda custody. If you're from Donegal, you may find this alarming. I certainly do.
Perhaps a more sensible approach would have been to rearrest Mr. A and charge him under another Act or section and argue in his double jeopardy appeal that in fact he was not been tried for the same offence (i.e. that construed by the 1935 Act) but that he was been tried for a different offence and only the facts were the same. I am very glad however he is back in prison. Will politicians now please stop interfering with the required objectivity of the courts.
Start with them & move on.
Neighbours,
Relatives,
Trusted Friends,
School Teachers,
Social Workers,
Prison staff,
let's jump the range of society
the Government.
made up of 3 equal and independent pillars.
Who has more power from that list?
Is it the mammy?
the screw?
the TD?
which uncle or auntie?
nous sommes toutes racailles, spide and skanger each one of us, it doesn't matter what accent you have, if you have a degree, what you do for a living, who your parents shagged, whether you come to accept being a spide or racaille or a chav or a skanger it really doesn't matter. You're not a TD.
& Let's leave the Senators out of it.