Men who have been convicted of unlawful carnal knowledge of girls under 15 will not now be able to seek their release following the handing down of the Supreme Court's reasons for ordering the re-arrest of Mr A last month, writes Carol Coulter, Legal Affairs Correspondent.
The court's judgments have been widely welcomed, with the Taoiseach saying it removed the appalling prospect of child rapists walking free, and brought clarity to the law.
Minister for Justice Michael McDowell also welcomed the judgment and said the Government's strategy on the issue had been vindicated.
It was also welcomed by the Fine Gael leader in the Seanad, Brian Hayes, but he criticised the Government handling of the case.
The Supreme Court could have made it clear in the first instance that its ruling would not have retrospective effect, he said, but the Government did not ask the court for such a clarification.
The Labour Party's spokesman on justice, Brendan Howlin, also welcomed the fact that convicted paedophiles would not now walk free, but added that the lengthy and complex judgments will require careful and detailed consideration. He urged the all-party committee on child protection to proceed speedily with its work.
The judgment has also been welcomed by the Rape Crisis Centre.
The five members of the Supreme Court issued five separate judgments yesterday, in which they unanimously ruled that there could be no automatic retrospective effect when a law was found to be unconstitutional.
It found that Mr A, who pleaded guilty to the rape of a 12-year-old girl after plying her with alcohol, could not have taken a case challenging the constitutionality of the statutory rape law himself, and was not entitled to benefit from someone else doing so.
It also found that where the State relies on a statute in good faith, and a person is convicted under it without attempting to challenge that statute in any way, then the final decision of the court is lawful even if the statute is found to be unconstitutional.
Mr A, a 41-year-old man, had served 18 months of a three-year sentence when Mr CC, a teenager charged with the statutory rape of a 14-year-old girl, challenged the law under which he was being tried.
That law, the 1935 Criminal Law (Amendment) Act, was ruled unconstitutional because he was unable to claim an honest mistake about the age of the girl.
Mr A then successfully sought his release in the High Court on the grounds that the law under which he had been convicted was unconstitutional.
This decision was overturned by the Supreme Court following an appeal by the State.
The five-judge court gave detailed reasons for its decision yesterday, unanimously finding that the striking down of a law as unconstitutional did not invalidate all actions taken under that law, especially when court cases were involved.
The Constitution permitted a distinction to be made between a declaration of invalidity and the retrospective effects of such a declaration on previous and finally decided cases, Mr Justice Murray, the Chief Justice, said.
"Can it seriously be said on the facts of the present case that the compulsion of public order and the common good would allow the application of the present applicant, Mr A, to succeed?" asked Ms Justice McGuinness.
Mr Justice Hardiman referred to the importance of "justice and true social order prominently mentioned in the Preamble to the Constitution".
Mr Justice Geoghean said: "It cannot have been the intention of the draftsmen of the Constitution, and more properly of the Oireachtas, and perhaps more properly still of the people, that if a statutory provision creating an offence was found to be unconstitutional, every past conviction and sentence, perhaps going back a large number of years, were ipso facto nullities."