Lisa Smith’s bid to have charges dismissed to be heard next week

The Special Criminal Court has agreed to next week hear a pre-trial application by former Defence Forces member Lisa Smith for orders striking out charges against her of being a member of Islamic State (Isis) and financing terrorism.

The three-judge non-jury court on Tuesday agreed to deal with the application on Monday.

Ms Smith, wearing a navy coat, grey hat and a black face covering, who is on bail, was in court to hear her lawyer, Michael O’Higgins SC, outline the basis for the application, made under section 4.e of the Criminal Procedure Act.

That section places certain restrictions on the reporting of such applications.

From Dundalk, Co Louth, the 39-year-old Ms Smith denies a charge of membership of an unlawful terrorist group Islamic State (Isis) between October 28th, 2015, and December 1st, 2019.

She has also denied a charge of financing terrorism by sending €800 in assistance, via a Western Union money transfer, to a named man on May 6th, 2015.

In the pre-trial application, her lawyers maintain the evidence is not sufficient to safely ground a conviction on any of the charges. This is disputed by the prosecution.

On Tuesday, Mr O’Higgins asked the court to consider a range of material provided by the defence before dealing with the pre-trial application.

Counsel said some of that arose from additional material provided to the defence two days before Christmas and his side had been “working around the clock” during the Christmas and New Year break to get through all the material.

He suggested a short adjournment to facilitate that consideration.

Sean Gillane SC, for the Director of Public Prosecutions, said he would be seeking to put in additional material for the purposes of the Section 4 application.

In the court’s ruling, Mr Justice Hunt said the pre-trial application had been served on the prosecution either on January 4th or 6th last with the trial due to begin on on January 11th.

The requisite 14 days’ notice for such an application had not been met, he said.

While the court was “not particularly happy” at the point in time in which the application was brought, it appeared the relevant law allowed such an application to be brought at any time.

In the circumstances, he said the court would abridge time for dealing with the application, was treating it as having been brought before the court and opened, and would deal with it on Monday.

There can be no subsequent challenge to the jurisdiction of the court dealing with the trial if the application is unsuccessful, he added.