The wrongful conviction of Osgur Breatnach for the Sallins train robbery half a century ago has now been declared a miscarriage of justice.<\/p>\n
The mail train robbery took place on 31 March, 1976 when the Cork-to-Dublin train was diverted near the Co Kildare town, and an estimated \u00a3200,000 was stolen.<\/p>\n
Mr Breatnach was found guilty by the non-jury Special Criminal Court in December 1978, but his conviction was overturned a year and a half later after a court found his confession had been obtained under oppression.<\/p>\n
At the Court of Appeal today, Ms Justice Isobel Kennedy said a newly discovered fact shows that there has been a miscarriage of justice.<\/p>\n
She said the newly discovered fact concerned alibi evidence. She said there was no dispute from the Director of Public Prosecutions that constitutes a newly discovered fact.<\/p>\n
She noted that Mr Breatnach asserts in his affidavit that he had “no hand, act or part” in the Sallins train robbery.<\/p>\n
Ms Justice Kennedy said the court was satisfied that the threshold for granting a miscarriage of justice certificate has been met.<\/p>\n
Mr Breatnach, who is now aged 75, was one of a number of members of the Irish Republican Socialist Party who were subsequently arrested.<\/p>\n
During interrogation, three men signed alleged confessions, and all exhibited injuries they claimed were inflicted by garda\u00ed.<\/p>\n
The confessions were obtained at the hands of the Heavy Gang garda unit, whose treatment of prisoners in custody became the subject of an Amnesty International report in 1977.<\/p>\n
In December 1978, Mr Breatnach and two others were convicted by the Special Criminal Court on their statements.<\/p>\n
Mr Breatnach was sentenced to 12 years in prison, but his conviction was quashed in May 1980, after the Court of Criminal Appeal ruled that his confession had been obtained under oppression.<\/p>\n
He had spent 18 months in jail by the time of his release.<\/p>\n
Within the same month, the IRA claimed responsibility for the theft.<\/p>\n
After the ruling, Mr Breatnach called for the Government to establish an independent public inquiry.<\/p>\n
“False alleged ‘confessions’ were coerced through brutality and torture. This so-called \u2018evidence\u2019 was backed up by perjury in the witness box of the Special Criminal Court by many of the 50+ garda\u00ed who gave evidence.<\/p>\n
“As a result of deliberate criminal actions by the State, bringing about systemic injustice, resulting in prolonged unjust imprisonment, damage to our health, as well as destroying our reputation and permanently affecting our lives, we are still calling for an independent public inquiry.<\/p>\n
We are entitled to the inquiry under International and European conventions as well as under our own Constitution.”<\/p>\n
Human rights organisations including The Irish Council for Civil Liberties, Amnesty International Ireland, the Committee on the Administration of Justice, Fair Trials and the Pat Finucane Centre, have long supported the cause of the six men known as the Sallins Men who were wrongfully accused, detained and tortured, and in the case of three of the men, convicted of having carried out the Sallins Train Robbery.<\/p>\n
Speaking on behalf of the five organisations, ICCL Executive Director Joe O’Brien, said: “While today it has finally been recognised that a miscarriage of justice occurred, the Government still refuses to investigate the grievous wrongs that were committed against the men.<\/p>\n
“Impunity for those involved has been facilitated by ongoing failures to properly investigate not just what happened to these men but why and at whose behest.<\/p>\n
“The Minister for Justice claims that this case is historic and has told us that he is satisfied there is ‘no matter of significant public concern that would warrant reopening the case and establishing a Commission of Investigation’. We urge the minister to reconsider his position.”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The wrongful conviction of Osgur Breatnach for the Sallins train robbery half a century ago has now been…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":560741,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[61,60,43],"class_list":["post-560740","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-ireland","tag-ie","tag-ireland","tag-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/560740","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=560740"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/560740\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/560741"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=560740"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=560740"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=560740"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}