A Circuit Court Judge has said that a female drug dealer avoided a "likely" prison sentence as a result of incomplete evidence given to his court by a garda, according to court documents seen by RTÉ.
According to the documents, Circuit Court Judge Keenan Johnson said that Garda Mark Lucas had given him the "clear impression" at a sentencing hearing for a drugs offence last June that the 39-year-old woman had a one-off involvement in the drugs trade, despite the garda having personally recorded an admission from the woman three days earlier that she was making around €2,000 per month selling drugs.
She made the admission to Garda Lucas after she was again caught in possession of both heroin and cocaine for sale or supply.
In a written record of his decision, obtained by RTÉ's This Week, Judge Johnson said it was of "considerable concern" to him that the garda had withheld critical information about the drug dealer from his court, relating to what the judge described as "very serious offences".
The judge made his remarks nine days ago at Mullingar Circuit Court sitting at Tullamore, when sentencing the woman for possession of €1,600 worth of cocaine and heroin.
The judge also said that his court was told the woman, who was also a drug user, was drug free on the date she was being sentenced in June 2016, when in fact she had disclosed to Garda Lucas that she even planned on bringing some of the heroin found in her possession with her to the court to have as a "supply to smoke" if she got a custodial sentence.
"At the time Garda Lucas gave evidence to the court [at the 7 June 2016 sentencing hearing] he was aware the accused had been apprehended" three days beforehand, the judge said.
He said: "Not alone that, but on 4 June the accused had given an interview to Garda Lucas … and had made full admissions concerning it.
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"It was a source of considerable concern to me when I was advised that this offence occurred, a mere three days before the previous offence was dealt with by this court on 7 June 2016."
"At no stage during these proceedings was I made aware of the fact that a mere three days before the 7 June the accused had been involved in serious reoffending. Indeed I am satisfied that I was misled in relation to this matter," the judge said in his written record.
He said: "In my view he [Garda Lucas] made a grave error of judgment in not telling the court the full background on the date of the sentencing hearing ... Garda Lucas had an obligation to give the court a full picture of the situation and not allow the court to proceed on the basis that there had been no [re]offending by the accused."
Judge Johnson said the offences were of a serious nature, given what he described as an "endemic" consumption of illegal drugs in Co Westmeath.
He said that at least 80% of the cases which come before his court were now drug related.
Judge Johnson said he accepted that the garda had made an error and said he also accepted the garda's explanation that he was motivated by trying to help the woman.
However, he said that "the court in imposing sentence has to be in possession of all the facts in order to secure a sentence that is both fair and proportionate," adding that had the court been aware that the accused had re-offended "she would likely have been given a custodial sentence".
He said that the re-offending had completely undermined the representations made to court that she had stayed out of trouble and was drug free.
