Establishment covers its tracks
How many of us in our daily workplaces cut corners, do friends
favours, and generally bend the rules. If most of us think long
enough about it, we are probably all guilty of helping friends in
beating the system.
There are some who see the actions of Justices O'Flaherty and Kelly
in this light. They are wrong. The two judges were not helping
someone jump a queue, get a cheap holiday, avoid paying VAT or
organising some nixer. Anne Ryan was killed by a drunk Philip Sheedy
speeding in his car. Yes, Sheedy might have felt remorse after the
fact. Yes, he might have offered to pay compensation and yes, he
might have found his jail term difficult to complete. These factors
were not reasons suspend a prison sentence.
What the actions of the two judges show is the how the political
establishment works. How many of us unhappy with how the legal system
has dealt with us would be able to move in the right social circles,
where Supreme Court judges can be prevailed upon to consider our
plight?
What was going through the minds of O'Flaherty and Kelly when they
intervened in the Sheedy case? This was not a case of disappearing
parking tickets; it was a case where one individual's actions had led
to another person losing their life.
Now the two judges have taken what many might conceive to be the
honourable a course of action and resigned. This might be the end of
the affair for them, but many other issues need to be tackled.
We need to look at how judgements are made. How can two justices give
completely different decisions on the same case? Why did the Minister
for Justice not react when Anne Ryan's family contacted his office?
Why is the appointment of a judge the spoils of political office?
Should there not be another more transparent way of appointing
judges?
The legal system and the political establishment it depends on do not
come out of the Sheedy affair well. Forcing the two judges to resign
seemed to be the sole priority of the Dublin government. They must
think again. They have not resolved the Sheedy case but have merely
dabbled with a far greater set of problems.
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