Court of Appeal: Appeal concerning interpretation of s.99(8A) of Criminal Justice Act 2006 succeeds

About this case:

• Citation:
  [2025] IECA 53
• Judgment:
  External link
• Court:
  Court of Appeal
• Judge:
  Ms Justice Tara Burns

Delivering judgment for the Court of Appeal, Ms Justice Tara Burns explained: “What gave Nenagh District Court jurisdiction over the suspended sentence matter arises pursuant to s. 99(8A) on foot of imposing sentence for the triggering offence. Once sentence was imposed in respect of that matter, the jurisdiction of Nenagh District Court expired and it could not have the suspended matter entered before it.”

Background

On 9 September 2021, Balbriggan District Court imposed a six-month prison term on the appellant, suspended for 18 months on terms and conditions, including a condition of good behaviour.

In July 2023, the appellant pleaded guilty before Nenagh District Court to a charge for a separate offence which allegedly occurred within the period of suspension of his 2021 sentence (the “triggering offence”). The appellant was unrepresented at his own election.

The appellant’s suspended sentence was not brought to the court’s attention at sentencing, and a three-month prison sentence was imposed. 

The prosecution later sought to re-enter the matter before Nenagh District Court on 21 July 2023 in order to bring that information to the court’s attention via the swearing of an affidavit. 

The appellant was produced at Nenagh District Court and prior to the case being called, the application was served on him and its purpose explained to him, but no legal representative had been contacted where the appellant had chosen to remain unrepresented on the last occasion and so it was not known who to contact.

Nenagh District Court remanded the appellant to Balbriggan District Court on 27 July 2023 pursuant to s.99(8A) of the Criminal Justice Act 2006 (as amended), which governs the remand procedure where a “triggering offence” is committed and states, inter alia, that “the court before which proceedings for the triggering offence are brought shall, after imposing sentence for that offence, remand the person in custody or on bail to a sitting of the court that made the said order to be held— (I) no later than 15 days after such remand, or (II) if there is no sitting of that court within that period, to the next sitting of that court thereafter…”

The High Court

The appellant sought to judicially review Nenagh District Court’s decision to remand him, claiming that under s.99(8A), the sentencing court for the triggering offence must on the same occasion as sentence is passed, remand the accused to the court which imposed the suspended sentence.

The appellant argued that the proceedings for the triggering offence will have concluded and that no mechanism exists to re-enter the matter before the court which is then functus officio in respect of the triggering offence and without jurisdiction in respect of the suspended sentence. 

The appellant also suggested that he was not afforded fair procedures by reason of the lack of notice to him with regard to the re-entering of the matter before Nenagh District Court.

The High Court determined that the plain and ordinary meaning of s.99(8A) did not require the remand to be made at the same sitting when sentence for the triggering offence was imposed, finding that the sentencing process for the triggering offence was distinct from the remand process and that remanding the appellant to Balbriggan District Court merely involved an administrative step to secure his attendance before that court, to be made within 15 days of the imposition of the sentence for the triggering offence.

The High Court also considered that the appellant should have asked Balbriggan District Court to rule on its jurisdiction to sentence the appellant on foot of the remand prior to initiating judicial review proceedings, and further found it unnecessary to consider the fair procedures argument as same was absent from the pleadings apart from a general plea of ultra vires and a generic defence that the appellant had been treated fairly. 

The High Court remitted the matter to the District Court. The appellant appealed the High Court’s findings as to his remand, his decision to bring judicial review proceedings and as to his fair procedures argument.

The Court of Appeal

Ms Justice Burns noted at the outset of her judgment that the substantive issue in respect of the jurisdiction of Nenagh District Court to remand the appellant involved a question of statutory interpretation, and that the High Court interpreted s.99(8A) as a mandatory precondition to reactivation of a sentence, which requires only that the matter must be dealt with by the original court within 15 days of the new sentence being imposed.

Finding that a literal reading of s.99(8A) does not allow remittal to take place within 15 days of sentencing for the triggering offence, where the sub-section did not make reference “to a court date being required to be set for the suspended sentence remand date 15 days from the date sentence was imposed in respect of the triggering offence”.

Instead, the Court of Appeal understood that the sub-section requires that after a sentence is imposed for the triggering offence, that same court shall make an order remanding the accused at the same court sitting.

Ms Justice Burns further explained: “As the time limitation of 15 days from the date of sentence for the triggering offence, which Gearty J applied to the section, is not a correct interpretation of s. 99(8A), the difficulty arises that no time limit is then placed on when the remand from the triggering court in respect of the suspended sentence must take place. Having regard to the fact that the triggering court is functus officio having sentenced an accused for the triggering offence, it cannot have been the intention of the Oireachtas that an application can be made at any time after such a sentence is imposed to remand a case to the suspended sentencing court.”

As to the jurisdiction of Nenagh District Court in relation to the remand matter, the court reasoned: “What gave Nenagh District Court jurisdiction over the suspended sentence matter arises pursuant to s. 99(8A) on foot of imposing sentence for the triggering offence. Once sentence was imposed in respect of that matter, the jurisdiction of Nenagh District Court expired and it could not have the suspended matter entered before it.”

Finding it unnecessary to address the remaining arguments made by the appellant, Ms Justice Burns nonetheless remarked that the fact that the appellant did not have notice of the re-entry application implied that unfairness occurred in that process.

Conclusion

Accordingly, the Court of Appeal granted an order of certiorari quashing the order made by Nenagh District Court remanding the appellant to Balbriggan District Court.

DPP v. John Paul Collins [2025] IECA 53