The Court of Criminal Appeal has quashed the conviction and nine-year sentence of a man for anally raping a woman at a hostel in Dún Laoghaire and ordered a retrial.
Peter Dolan (44), from Wolverhampton, was convicted of anally raping the Limerick woman on March 13th, 1999. He was also convicted of assault causing harm to the woman.
Giving the grounds for the CCA decision, Mr Justice Nicholas Kearns, sitting with Mr Justice Liam McKechnie and Mr Justice Michael Hanna, said that the trial judge, Mr Justice Paul Carney, had given no "legally valid" reason for his refusal to warn the jury that the woman's evidence was uncorroborated.
Giving such a warning was discretionary but every important ruling by a trial judge should be reasoned and based on legal principle, he said. "Regrettably, the ruling in the present case cannot be seen as meeting either requirement." The ruling was also of considerable significance in the context of the trial as a whole as the jury had convicted Mr Dolan of anal rape but acquitted him of other rape charges, Mr Justice Kearns added.
If it was the view of counsel for both sides and of the judge himself in this case that there was no corroboration, the charge to the jury should have made that clear, the court said. The failure to do so gave rise to an apprehension that the jury treated evidence of bleeding in the region of the woman's anus as providing corroboration sufficient to convict, Mr Justice Kearns said.
Mr Justice Carney appeared to have based his refusal on an earlier judgment by Ms Justice Catherine McGuinness, who indicated that to give such a warning was "demeaning" of women. However, neither counsel nor the court were aware of any prior case where Ms Justice McGuinness was alleged to have made the comments attributed to her, Mr Justice Kearns added.