DPP v Ó Súilleabháin

• Jurisdiction: Ireland
• Judgment Date: 01 January 1995
• Date: 01 January 1995
• Court: Supreme Court

(S.C.)

Director of Public Prosecutions

and

Ó Súilleabháin

- Validity - Road traffic offence -Drink driving - Opinion of garda that defendant had committed an offence - Whether necessary for the garda to say that he had formed the opinion at that time that the accused had committed an offence under the relevant section - Road Traffic Act, 1961 (No. 24), s. 49.

The defendant was prosecuted in the District Court on charges pursuant to the Road Traffic Act, 1961, as amended. The defendant had been involved in a road traffic accident and a member of the Garda Síochána arrived on the scene shortly afterwards. The defendant admitted that he was driving the vehicle involved in the accident. The garda's evidence was that he got a strong smell of intoxicating liquor from the defendant and, following a conversation with the defendant, formed the opinion that he had consumed intoxicating liquor. The garda gave evidence that he informed the defendant on the spot that the defendant had committed an offence or was committing an offence under s. 49(2) or (3) of the 1961 Act and that he was arresting him under s. 49(6). The district judge concluded that the garda, in order to have the power to arrest the accused under s. 49(6), should have given evidence to the effect that he had formed the opinion that the defendant had, by reason of the consumption of intoxicating liquor, become unable to exercise proper control over the vehicle which he was driving. The charges against the defendant were dismissed. A case was stated for the opinion of the High Court as to whether the district judge was correct in law in dismissing the charges. The High Court held that the charges should not have been dismissed. The defendant appealed to the Supreme Court. The only issue was whether the district judge was correct in reaching the conclusion, as a matter of law on the evidence before her, that the defendant had not...