The Supreme Court has dismissed a test challenge to the use of the Intoxilyzer and Intoximeter breath-testing machines in drink-driving cases. A detailed judgment will be given later.
The five-judge court, presided over by the Chief Justice, Mr Justice John Murray, yesterday rejected appeals by two publicans and a mechanic against the High Court's rejection in September 2004 of their challenge to the use of the machines.
The challenge was brought on constitutional grounds. It was claimed a person tested would be unable to rebut the eventual result because breath samples obtained by using the machines could not, unlike blood or urine samples, be independently tested or analysed.
The appellants were two publicans - Oliver Quinlan, Rathdown Villas, Terenure, Dublin, and John Purcell, The Priory, Grange Road, Rathfarnham - while the third appellant was Ashley McGonell, a mechanic, Glaslough, Co Monaghan.
During the High Court case, the judge was told the three were among a possible 80 challengers to the relevant provisions of the 1994 Road Traffic Act.
The appellants complained the legal requirements meant that the discretion as to the nature of the testing lay entirely with the arresting gardaí. It was claimed that, in the case of the Intoxilyzer and unlike the blood and urine test, there was no "split" sample.
The Director of Public Prosecutions had rejected the claims and denied that the Intoxilyzer apparatus was inherently liable to wide or significant deviations in the measurements of breath alcohol levels as alleged.
In each of the three cases, the appellants had been arrested under the Road Traffic Act and required to provide two specimens of breath.
The three had claimed that, in proceedings pending against them, they were deprived of their constitutional rights to a fair trial and fair procedures because they could not have breath samples independently tested and analysed. They sought declarations that the purported calculation of the concentration of alcohol contained in statements given to them after they breathed into the machines was invalid and unconstitutional.
They had contended the High Court had erred when it found in its judgment in September 2004 that the right of an accused person to inspect the machine in question was an important safeguard as was the administrative practice of waiting 20 minutes before commencing a test.
After hearing submissions yesterday, the Supreme Court said it was dismissing the appeals but would give detailed reasons in a judgment later.