In the Irish Courts
| Date | 01 January 1969 |
| Published date | 01 January 1969 |
| DOI | 10.1177/002201836903300108 |
| Subject Matter | Article |
In
the
Irish
Courts
COURT
OF
CRIMINAL
APPEAL IN
EIRE
HEARSAY
AND
THE
RES GESTAE
The
People
(A.G.) v.
Crosbie
and
Meeham
SINCE the seventeenth century, the fundamental rule against the
admission of hearsay evidence has been subject to the exception
that
words spoken which are
part
of the
res
gestae
are admissible.
In
acriminal trial, the event with which the words sought to be
admitted must be connected is
"the
commission of the crime itself":
see
per
Lord Normand in Lejzar
Teper
o, The
Q!.teen
(1952, A.C. 480,
487).
In
that
case, Lord Normand stated
that
"to
be admissible, it is
essential
that
the words
•..
should be, if not absolutely contempora-
neous with the action or event, at least so closelyassociated with it in
time, place
and
circumstances,
that
they are
part
of the thing being
done
and
so an item or
part
of real evidence
and
not merely a
reported statement".
In
R.
u.
Christie
(1914, A.C. 545), the House of
Lords held
that
statements made by boys alleged to have been the
victims of assaults should have been excluded on the ground
that
they were
"not
so immediately connected with" the crime as to be
part
of it, because they were "so separate by time
and
circumstances
from the actual commission of the crime".
The
question for the
Court is usually one of degree:
and
so it was in The
People
(A.G.) v.
Crosbie
and
Meehan
(1966, l.R. 490).
In
that
case, the two appellants
had
been charged together with
two other men with the murder of one, Murphy.
The
charge arose
out
of
a fight which developed in a room in a building on the Dublin
docks
and
which resulted in
Murphy
being stabbed by Crosbie.
The
accused were found guilty of manslaughter and, being refused a
certificate
of
leave to appeal by the trial judge, they appealed from
this decision
and
sought leave from the Court of Criminal Appeal.
Crosbie's principal ground
of
appeal was
that
the trial
judge
was
wrong in admitting in evidence a statement by a witness
that
he
had
heard
Murphy
say,
"He
has a knife, he stabbed me". This statement
was alleged to have been made aminute after the crime was com-
mitted
and
at a time at which Crosbie (but none
of
the other three
accused) was still standing in his presence.
It
was argued
that
the
61
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