Attorney General v Durnan (No. 2)
| Jurisdiction | Ireland |
| Judgment Date | 16 May 1934 |
| Date | 16 May 1934 |
| Court | Court of Criminal Appeal (Irish Free State) |
Admissibility - Confession of accomplice - Confession handed to accused after arrest - Accused refusing to make any statement - Whether silence of accused an admission of guilt or corroboration of evidence of accomplice - Comments of trial Judge in charge to jury on silence of accused -Misdirection - Effect of cross-examination of accused - Caution to be given to an accused when arrested and charged - Substance and effect of caution.
D. was arrested and charged with having conspired with F. to steal a after the of coin. It was not until three years quantity commission of the crime that D. was arrested and charged. At his trial it was proved that he had been interrogated by the police twice prior to his arrest, and that he had each time denied all knowledge of the crime. When in the police station he was handed a copy of a statement made by F., who was then a prisoner on remand, charged with certain crimes not connected with the stealing of the coin. In this statement F. confessed to having stolen the coin, but alleged that the crime had been conceived and planned by D., and the statement gave particulars of the crime. Prior to the statement being shown to D. he had been cautioned. After D. had read this statement he was asked if be wished to make any statement, and he said "No." The trial Judge told the jury that the statement and D.'s reply were admissible in evidence and that D.'s failure to deny the statement was open to the interpretation that silence was the silence of guilt, and that if they (the jury) so interpreted it, they had D. himself corroborating the statement of F., on which the prosecution sought to rely. D. was convicted and sentenced. The trial Judge refused...
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DPP v John Paul Buck
...v. Cleary [1934] 1 Frewen 14 at p. 17). Equally so what the Court of Criminal Appeal stated in The Attorney General v. Durnan (No. 2) [1934] I.R. 540 (‘ Durnan’), remains as valid today as it was when stated, namely that this caution, ‘is no idle formulae’ (p. 548). Finally, it is also wort......
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...Ní Raifeartaigh Evidence in Criminal Trials, (Dublin, 2014) p. 671, 674 and 688; DPP v. Buck [2014] IECCA 45 approves A.G. v. Durnan [1934] I.R. 540 which in turn approved R. v. Naylor, cited in Sandes, supra. Most of the foregoing are general points, applying to criminal cases generally.......
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Fitzgerald v DPP
...v. Buck [2014] IECCA 45, ( Unreported, Court of Criminal Appeal, 27 November 2014) approves Attorney-General v. Durnan (No 2) [1934] I.R. 540 which in turn approved Rex v. Naylor [1933] 1 K.B. 685, cited in Sandes, above.” 34 . The District Judge indicated that she was very familiar with O......
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...evidence can be used at trial. Counsel for the appellant also relies on the dictum of Murnaghan J in Attorney General v Durnan (No. 2) [1934] IR 540, when discussing Rule 4 of the Judge's rules and the caution required to be given to persons whom it is proposed to question, where he said (......