The court poor box system should be reformed to get rid of the perception that wealthy defendants can buy their way out of a conviction, according to a report released today.
Around €1 million is donated to the court poor box each year, generally by first time offenders or people who are involved in public order offences.
The Law Reform Commission (LRC) said it had been argued that the system allowed well-off offenders to escape without a criminal record while poorer people were convicted due to their inability to pay.
"The commission did not accept that people of means can actually buy their way out of a conviction but it concluded that the perception that the disposition was used in such a way was problematic," it said in its report.
There is no specific law which permits the use of the court poor box but judges have used their discretion under common law.
Under the proposed new Probation of Offenders Act, judges would be allowed to make Financial Reparation Orders. The money would be paid into a ring-fenced fund which would be operated by an advisory committee, rather than leaving the allocation to the discretion of judges as happens at present.
The LRC said the amounts which are paid into the court poor box in specific cases varied greatly with some judges requiring the same sum in all cases, irrespective of the means of the accused, while others set the level of payment according to the gravity of the offence.
It said it was not appropriate for judges to use the court poor box as a means of `topping-up' the level of fines when the fines provided in the legislation were not sufficient.
The LRC report said, in reference to the conviction in 2003 of chef Tim Allen for possessing child pornography, that he had been ordered to complete 240 hours of community service and to pay €40,000 euro to the court poor box. It said this had deprived the State of the maximum €1,906 fine payable under the Child Trafficking and Pornography Act 1998.
"The commission considers that where a court intends to impose a financial penalty in addition to community service (which is imposed as an alternative to imprisonment), that financial penalty should take the form of a fine as prescribed by the relevant legislation," the report concluded.
PA