In the Irish Courts
| Date | 01 October 1955 |
| DOI | 10.1177/002201835501900407 |
| Published date | 01 October 1955 |
| Subject Matter | Article |
In the Irish Courts
HIGH
COURT
IN
EIRE
INFORMING ACCUSED OF
RIGHT
TO JURY TRIAL
The State (Hastings) v. Reddin
SEC T ION 17 of
the
SummaryJurisdiction Act, 1879 enacted
that
where an accused has a right to be tried by a
jury
he
must
be informed of
that
fact before
the
charge is gone into.
The
question whether
the
accused can waive his right
and
thus
condone an irregularity has been debated on several occasions,
with
the
ultimate conclusion reached in Stephani v. John
(1948, I
K.B.
158), in which
the
Court
accepted
the
statement
of
the
law by Wright J. in R. v. Cockshott (1898, IQ.B. 592.
586)
that
"there
cannot be a waiver of a right which
the
defendant does
not
know he has. I
doubt
whether he could
waive
the
right to be informed of his option to be tried by a
jury
if he knew
that
he had
that
option. I am inclined to
think that,
the
duty to inform having been imposed
upon
the
court for the protection of all accused persons, the right to
be informed could not be waived".
In
Stephani v. John it
followed
that
counsel's statement
that
the accused desired a
summary trial
and
would raise no technical objection was
not
binding on
the
accused, when he later relied (successfully)
on the plea
that
he was informed of his right to
jury
trial,
not
before,
but
during, the investigation of the charge.
In
Ireland,
however, s. 77 of
the
Courts of Justice Act, 1924 (coupled
with Rule 59 (I) of the District
Court
Rules) provided no
more
than
that
the
accused should consent to summary trial:
there was no provision
that
the
Court
should inform
the
accused of his right to trial by jury.
In
The State (Keohane) v.
Cork County Court Judge &anr, (1946
I.R.
365) it was held
that
where the accused's legal adviser had asked for a summary
trial this was a sufficient consent on behalf of the accused, so
that
the
Court
of summary jurisdiction thereupon had juris-
diction to proceed as if the accused himself had consented.
By s. 2 (2) (a) of
the
Criminal Justice Act, 1951, however, it
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