NI High Court

Court dismisses case because there were too few present who were likely to be offended?

Mick Fealty on April 5, 2014, 9:01 am

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Interesting judgement yesterday… A small group of around 15 nationalist protesters was said to have been gathered nearby. However, the defendants’ lawyer argued that the band was playing Sloop John B, the Beach Boys’ song which has the same tune. After hearing evidence the district judge made no ruling on whether or not it was the Famine Song being played. But it was decided that the prosecution had failed to establish there was an intention to provoke a breach of …

Clash over inquests between the coroner and the Attorney General to be resolved in High Court

Brian Walker on December 19, 2012, 6:39 pm

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Good news for the families, that a new inquest will be held on the victims of the Hillsborough disaster, on application by the Attorney General for England and Wales Dominic Grieve to the High Court in London. The lord chief justice said it was “inevitable” that the emergence of fresh evidence about how and why the 96 victims died made it “desirable and reasonable for a fresh inquest to be heard”. “However distressing or unpalatable, the truth will be brought …

“Shaun Woodward ordered his recall on the basis of what his legal team have described as ‘closed material’.”

Pete Baker on December 19, 2011, 5:16 pm

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The BBC reports that Martin Corey has been “granted leave to seek a judicial review of the decision to revoke his licence over unspecified allegations that he was involved with dissident republicans.” The 61-year-old from Lurgan, County Armagh had been released on licence in 1992, having served 19 years of a life sentence for the murder of two RUC officers. In April last year, then Northern Ireland Secretary of State, Shaun Woodward, as the BBC report notes, “ordered his recall on the …

High Court rules NI Environment Minister’s official statements to Assembly unlawful

Pete Baker on October 1, 2010, 3:15 pm

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The BBC reports that the High Court has ruled that the then NI Environment Minister, the DUP’s Sammy Wilson, unlawfully changed planning policy in two ministerial statements to the Assembly in May and June of last year. Mr Justice Treacy ordered the ministerial statements to be quashed. From the BBC report …lawyers for the Department of the Environment argued the statements merely offered clarification and guidance within an existing and well established policy framework and did not amount to a change …