State (Griffin), The v Bell

• Jurisdiction: Ireland
• Judgment Date: 20 December 1962
• Date: 20 December 1962
• Court: Supreme Court

(S.C.)

State (Griffin)

and

Bell

Charges of alleged offences committed in London contrary to the Bankruptcy Act, 1914 - English warrants endorsed for execution in Ireland - Evidence adduced verifying authenticity of warrants - Sufficiency of evidence - Whether acts alleged in warrants constitute offences in English law - Petty Sessions (Ir.) Act,1851, s. 29.

On the 6th December, 1960, the prosecutor was taken into custody by a member of the Garda Siochána on foot of two warrants signed by a Justice of the Peace for the Borough of Kingston-upon-Thames, London, and duly endorsed for execution in Ireland by a Deputy Commissioner of the Garda Siochána. The prosecutor was brought to, and detained in, the Bridewell, in Dublin, for the purpose of being handed over to the British police authorities. The warrants contained recitals that informations on oath had been laid against the prosecutor alleging offences under the Bankruptcy Act 1914, an English statute which had never applied in Ireland. The prosecutor obtained in the High Court a conditional order of habeas corpus. Held by the Supreme Court (reversing the order of the High Court) that the cause shown should be disallowed and the conditional order of habeas corpus made absolute. Per Walsh J. (delivering the judgment of the Court): "In this case there is no evidence that the matters complained against the applicant in the warrants are offences or crimes under English law and, in my view, it is no answer for the respondents to say that the applicant has not adduced...