The number of charges brought in relation to child sex abuse cases has fallen in the past 18 months, according to the Director of Public Prosecutions.
This has arisen from the view taken by the higher courts that cases brought many years, or even decades, since the abuse occurred cannot be prosecuted fairly because key witnesses may be dead, or their recollection may be faulty.
The DPP, Mr James Hamilton, was speaking yesterday at the publication of his annual report for 2001. He was commenting on the fact that a number of successful judicial reviews had been taken challenging such cases.
"It is more satisfactory from the point of view of the victim. They get a detailed decision from the court on why the case cannot go ahead," he said. The DPP is precluded from giving explanations of why individual cases cannot be prosecuted when the decision is taken by his office.
"There are new files coming in now that are very old, and are therefore effectively unprosecutable," he said.
The annual report shows a fall in the number of files received by the DPP's office last year, compared with 2000. However, Mr Hamilton said that this was accounted for by the fact that the Garda had more authority to decide on some of the more minor cases going to summary trial in the District Court.
He said that already more files had been received at this stage of 2002 than in the whole of 2001, indicating that the increase in the crime figures, revealed in the Garda annual report published this week, was feeding through.
He said the main achievement of the office in 2001 was its incorporation of the criminal section of the Chief State Solicitor's Office. This had been recommended by the Nally report on criminal prosecutions. It resulted in an increase in staff in the DPP's office from 30 to 120, and an increase in budget from €5.27 million in 1997 to an estimated €28.78 million in 2003.
Ms Claire Loftus, who as Chief Prosecution Solicitor heads this section, said that new work had been taken on by this division, and there would be specialist solicitors to deal with it, notably in areas like white-collar crime, money-laundering and breaches of company and competition law.
The report showed that €11,270,195 had been paid to counsel in fees in 2001. This compared with €10,018,233 for 2000.
The level of fees varies acc-ording to the court in which counsel appears. At the moment, fees for the Central Criminal Court, a division of the High Court, are €7,388 as a brief fee (preparation of the case and the first day in court) for senior counsel prosecuting a murder, and €5,910 brief in a rape case. Refresher fees (for subsequent days in court) are €1,902 a day. They can be more in exceptionally complex cases. Junior counsels earn two-thirds of the senior's fee.
Mr Hamilton said that this system, where independent counsel are engaged by the State on a case-by-case basis, costs less than systems in other jurisdictions where the prosecuting counsel are employed by the state.
Asked about changes he was seeking in the law, Mr Hamilton said that at present it was not possible for him to appeal against a judge's ruling in the course of a trial that could have the result, not only of an acquittal, but of establishing precedent for future trials. Such a ruling could be made verbally during a trial in the Circuit Criminal Court and have a binding effect on future trials, without being argued out fully.
He said he favoured a without-prejudice right of appeal in such cases, to allow the point of law to be settled in a higher court, without affecting the outcome of the specific case which had been decided.
He is asking the Minister for Justice to consider it urgently.