People (Attorney General) v McClure

• Jurisdiction: Ireland
• Court: Court of Criminal Appeal
• Judgment Date: 13 June 1945
• Date: 13 June 1945

Court of Criminal Appeal.

The People (Attorney-General) v. McClure.

THE PEOPLE (at the suit of the Attorney-General)

and

ROBINSON McCLURE (1)

Criminal law - Appeal against sentence - Charge of gross indecency - Offence admitted by accused - First offence - Accused a man of exceptionally high character - Medical evidence - Severity of sentence - Sentence reduced.

Criminal Appeal.

This was an application for leave to appeal against the sentence of fifteen calendar months imprisonment with hard labour which had been imposed upon the accused by the Circuit Court Judge (Judge Wyse Power) on a charge of gross indecency to which the accused had pleaded guilty.

After the accused had pleaded guilty in the Circuit Court, the following evidence was given.

Inspector Kingston, of the Civic Guard, testified that the accused came of a very respectable family and had never come under the notice of the police before. He stated that the accused had a wife and two children, one of whom was an invalid from birth.

John O'Hagan, Managing Director of the firm where the accused was employed, stated that he had known the accused for sixteen years and that he had been secretary of the firm for eleven years. He stated that he could say nothing except the very best about the accused and that when he (the Managing Director) was absent, the accused had full control, and blank cheques were left for him.

Dr. Francis McMenamin stated that he had examined the accused on three occasions, once in consultation with Dr. Dunne. He had found evidence of a very highly-strung hysterical type. The accused had given him an account of his movements on the evening to which the charge related

and had appeared to give a very full and candid account. The memory of accused was clear up to a certain period of the evening and then he appeared to have what he (Dr. McMenamin) considered a general amnesia. He did not regard this amnesia as feigned. He stated that accused told him that he usually took three or four bottles of stout, but that on the evening in question he took eight or nine whiskies. From investigation of the accused's mental state he formed the opinion that he was not a sexual psychopath. He stated that the accused told him that he had two children one of whom was an invalid and mentally defective; that he had brought the child during the previous year to numerous specialists who had told him that the child would neither live nor develop. Because of that he and his wife had...