Enoch Burke’s sister Jemima has had a district court conviction for a public order offence quashed by the High Court.

And the management consultant will not have to face a re-hearing of the case, a High Court judge also ruled.

However, Ms Justice Sara Phelan said she did not consider an award of compensatory damages over the matter appropriate or necessary.

The High Court had heard last May that the State would not oppose the quashing of the public order conviction involving alleged mobile phone videoing by Ms. Burke.

The State, however, argued the matter should still be sent back to the original court for a new hearing.

Jemima Burke, 30, had been granted permission to seek judicial review of her case after she alleged her constitutional rights were breached when she was arrested, charged, and convicted of a public order offence within a matter of hours. She also sought that her case should not be remitted due to her constitutional rights.

Ms Burke was convicted of a public order offence on June 20 last year by Judge Vincent Deane in Ballina District Court in Co Mayo.

Ms Burke, a management consultant in professional services, said she attended an inquest in Swinford, Co Mayo, on June 20, concerning the death of a sepsis patient at Mayo University Hospital.

She was later arrested and her phone confiscated. She was brought to Ballina Garda Station where she was detained in a cell, she claimed, for more than two hours.

She was then charged with two public order offences relating to a breach of the peace.

She said when she appeared before Judge Deane she refused to sign a bail bond.

Judge Deane, she claimed, told her it would be unjust to adjourn the matter if she was not going to sign the bond, that there was little chance of her going to prison and that he had “to protect your interests at some level, too”.

Ms Burke was convicted of one of the public order offences, under Section 6 of the Public Order Act, with the other taken into consideration, and fined €350.

In her High Court proceedings, she argued she had been the victim of a “serious” miscarriage of justice in that there was “excessive haste” in hearing the original case.

Ms Justice Phelan in the High Court on Thursday said it could not be gainsaid that the manner in which the district court judge approached the hearing was peremptory “notwithstanding the well-intentioned rationale behind such approach.” 

She said the district court judge had approached the matter with a view to protecting Ms Burke’s interests, such that he did not want her to be remanded in custody.

However, Ms Justice Phelan said Ms Burke was entitled to choose not to enter into a bail bond, and her right to a fair trial in due course of law was an absolute right.

“In preferring not to remand her in custody and thereby conducting the trial on the same day on which the offence allegedly occurred, it is clear the district court judge fell into error.” Ms Justice Phelan said.

The actions of the district court judge, Ms Justice Phelan said, were such “as to deprive Ms Burke of her constitutional right to a fair trial and the district court ought not to have embarked on the hearing on June 20, 2024”, she said, ruling the district court had acted in excess of jurisdiction from the outset.

Ms Justice Phelan said she was not prepared to remit the matter for further hearing and she also ruled  Ms Burke was not entitled to an award of compensatory damages.

The judge said she was inclined to award Ms Burke as a litigant in person her expenses and outlay in respect of the application, but the parties could mention the matter when it comes back before the court in October.