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A police officer convicted of sexually assaulting his 10-year-old goddaughter at his home in 2016 has had his conviction overturned on appeal.
The man’s attorney, Colman Cody SC, had argued before the Court of Appeal that the trial judge had presented “an unbalanced view of the evidence” in his charge, as he made no reference to the plaintiff’s cross-examination, when reading transcripts of interviews with her to the jury.
Mr. Cody said that Judge Thomas Teehan should have made some reference to the inconsistencies the defense had raised about the girl’s evidence “to ensure fairness and balance” and that failure to do so had prevented her from coming forward. ” a fair synopsis “of the general case. to the jury.
The garda, who cannot be identified for legal reasons, was sentenced to seven years in prison with the last three years suspended after being convicted of the crime by a majority verdict following a trial in Circuit Criminal Court in January 2019. .
The appellant denied having sexually assaulted his wife’s niece, who was also his goddaughter, at his home on November 27, 2016. He was suspended from the public force shortly after a formal complaint was filed.
Appealing his conviction to the Court of Appeal last month, Mr. Cody asserted that while the trial judge is not required to rehearse the cross-examination of a witness in detail, it is incumbent upon the judge, at the very least, to remind the jury that the direct evidence was not the full witness evidence and it was necessary to evaluate all the evidence, which included cross-examination.
Roisin Lacey SC argued on behalf of the Director of Public Prosecution (DPP) that there was no standard formula on how a trial judge should indict a jury as long as they dealt substantially and adequately with all relevant matters. “It was a fair trial and a fair indictment for the jury,” Lacey said. He claimed that the man’s defense “fundamentally had no more nuances than outright denial, that the offense simply did not happen.”
In a written sentence issued electronically Wednesday, Judge Isobel Kennedy said it was “less than ideal” that the trial judge did not mention “not even the fact of the questioning.” The charge must be balanced by whatever means a judge in a given case deems appropriate and it is essential that a judge present an “impartial review” of the evidence fairly, he noted.
“While a judge is not required to remind the jury of all the evidence or all the arguments, however, the jury should be reminded of the salient features of the trial to assist the jury in their role and direct them to the court. matters of fact that require determination ”, he highlighted.
Judge Kennedy said that when the full transcript of the direct testimony was read verbatim, the trial judge should have invited the jury “at a minimum” to consider all of the evidence from the witness, including their questioning.
In addition, Judge Kennedy said that a cause for concern for the court was that after reading the full transcript of the interviews and making no reference to cross-examination, the trial judge compounded the error by warning the jury: evidence about the night in question [the complainant]. “This, Judge Kennedy said, made the charge lopsided and amounted to a mistake in principle.
Justice Kennedy, sitting with the President of the Court of Appeals, Justice George Birmingham and Justice Patrick McCarthy, said the court would overturn the conviction for sexual assault.
At a later hearing on Wednesday afternoon, the three-judge panel granted the state’s request for a new trial and the man was placed in pretrial detention.
The trial heard that the girl and her mother were visiting the home of the garda and his wife for the night before a family trip to visit Santa.
The three adults had attended a table contest at a local pub, but the man was the first to go home to allow a babysitter to leave.
The court heard that the man allegedly entered the bedroom where his niece slept and sexually assaulted her.
The girl told specialized interviewers that she pretended to be asleep when her uncle rubbed her neck before penetrating her “front butt” with his finger for several minutes.
The court heard that the incident had a devastating impact on the girl and she feared that her uncle would go to her home or school because he had told her mother what had happened.
When asked to write down how she felt, the girl wrote on a piece of paper: “very sad, scared, lonely, angry and disappointed.”
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