Inmate expects he will "go another day yet"

JOHN Gallagher sat beside his parents throughout the reading of the judgment, his sun burnt face expressionless as each of the…

JOHN Gallagher sat beside his parents throughout the reading of the judgment, his sun burnt face expressionless as each of the three judges outlined in turn the reasons he should not be released.

But he had the satisfaction of hearing each of the judges deliver mild rebukes to the Minister for Justice for her handling of his case.

Gallagher had applied to the High Court to be released from the Central Mental Hospital in Dundrum on the grounds that his continued detention was illegal.

The judges accepted that the Minister's proposal for a limited programme of short term, supervised reassess was adequate.

READ MORE

The judges complained of unjustifiable delays in the Minister's response to an advisory committee which recommended short release periods for Gallagher. However, they agreed that the Minister had responded reasonably in the end.

They expressed concern at a lack of transparency in the execution of her "quasi judicial" role, while accepting that she was not improperly influenced in arriving at decisions about his case.

Each of the judges rehearsed the Minister's "conservative" programme of temporary releases: one escorted outing a month until December, with an extra family outing near Christmas, all supervised by Dundrum staff.

Ms Justice Laffoy agreed with Gallagher's counsel that there was some ambiguity in the Government's attitude to this programme - the Department seemed reluctant to consider it a process of "phased release".

But she said there was no doubt that, if these outings were successful, the trend would be towards more frequent and longer periods, and eventually complete release.

When the last of the three judgments was delivered just after 2.15 p.m., Gallagher stayed on in the courtroom to chat with his legal team, before speaking briefly with his mother.

Earlier in the day he had intervened in a quasi legal dispute of a different kind. His father was tackled outside the door of the courtroom by a freelance photographer who claimed he had damaged his camera in a scuffle outside the building.

Mr Gallagher snr had entered the Four Courts with a newspaper held in front of his face. When the photographer tried to get a picture, Mr Gallagher aimed a kick which connected with the camera.

The matter was eventually resolved in the corridor after two gardai were called, and a representative of the family promised that the damage would be paid for.

Before leaving the court by taxi after the judgment, John Gallagher told reporters he was "obviously not too pleased" but would be discussing the judgment with his legal team. "I've been at this a long time, but I'll have to go another day yet," he said.

Frank McNally

Frank McNally

Frank McNally is an Irish Times journalist and chief writer of An Irish Diary