This morning/afternoon
In 2015, the [Supreme Court] ruled that evidence obtained unconstitutionally could be admitted if a garda claims to have had no knowledge of the breach .
Via The Irish Times:
[The so-called “green garda/good faith” exception) in practice means that a garda can inadvertently breach a citizen’s fundamental rights, such as the right to privacy from the government, without there being any repercussions in relation to the evidence gathered.
….The Irish Council for Civil Liberties (ICCL) commissioned a report on the impact of the new rule five years out from the decision.
Practitioners said that the greatest impact of the decision is before the case ever gets to trial. Two-thirds of practitioners said they changed their advice to clients after JC because “you know they are not going to win”.
As citizens in a democracy, we may well wonder whether the “real chilling effect”, strong sense of inertia and defeatism that JC has reportedly induced, are qualities we may wish for among criminal law practitioners. Rates of guilty pleas, according to the DPP’s most recent report, now stand at 92 per cent in Ireland.
“While several referenced a drive towards professionalisation of policing in recent years, there was also an acknowledgment that not all elements within the force adhere to high standards.
Experienced practitioners referred during interviews to gardaí lying when giving evidence, threatening to arrest close relatives, planting evidence and physically assaulting clients.”
Ill-effects of change to law on evidence starting to manifest (Irish Times)
