Convicted rapist sues DPP over delay in review of non-prosecution of prison guards for alleged perjury

The action has been taken by Darius Savickis, who wants the High Court to direct the DPP to complete a review into the decision not to prosecute prison officers over evidence they gave before the High Court in 2013.

Mr Savickis, 48, was awarded damages after the jury hearing his civil action found he was assaulted by several prison guards on 29 September 2009, while he was serving a sentence at Castlerea Prison for orally raping a 23-year-old woman.

The prison assault was captured on CCTV.

In High Court proceedings, Mr Savickis claims that the DPP agreed in 2017, as part of an agreement to settle other proceedings he had brought, to review the decision not to prosecute anyone over the evidence given to the High Court.

He claims his solicitors wrote to the DPP in March, April and November 2018 asking about what progress had been made in the review.

In a response received in early January, the DPP’s office stated the review is “ongoing”, taking longer than anticipated and would be “concluded early in the New Year”.

No explanation has been offered for the delay in conducting the review, it is claimed.

In 2013, a jury hearing Mr Savickis’s High Court civil action awarded him €224 after force had been used by the officers. Attributing 95 per cent responsibility to Mr Savickis, the jury reduced its award from €4,500 to €224.

He appealed and, in 2016, the Court of Appeal found he was assaulted and awarded him €10,000, plus €5,000 exemplary damages over the evidence given by the prison officers and €2,225 over the use of unreasonable force.

The Court of Appeal concluded that prison officers had lied under oath as part of an effort “to hide their complicity” in what was wrongful conduct in the face of overwhelming evidence to the contrary.

The judge presiding over the High Court action in 2013 remarked that the CCTV pictures made it “blatantly obvious” Mr Savickis was “punched by a prison officer who denied it with all his colleagues”.

In 2017, Mr Savickis applied to the High Court for permission to bring judicial review proceedings against the DPP and Garda Commissioner over the DPP’s March 2017 decision not to prosecute the prison officers for perjury.

That action was compromised after the DPP agreed to review the decision not to prosecute.

In his latest judicial review action, Mr Savickis seeks damages, as well as an order directing the DPP to complete the review within such time the High Court deems fit and proper.

He also seeks various declarations, including that the DPP has had a reasonable time to complete the review, that the DPP has breached his rights to fair procedures, and that the DPP has breached its duty to vindicate Mr Savickis’s rights as a victim of a crime to bodily integrity.

Permission to bring the action against the DPP was granted, on an ex parte basis, by Mr Justice Seamus Noonan on Monday.

The judge made the matter returnable to a date in March.

Aodhan O Faolain, Ireland International News Agency Ltd.