Warm tributes were paid yesterday to one of the State’s longest-serving judges, Judge Joseph Mangan, on his retirement after 27 years on the bench.
Legal practitioners in the Co Clare circuit were only informed of Judge Mangan’s decision to retire on Thursday. They joined with nine of Judge Mangan’s colleagues from the bench in the Circuit and District Courts to pay tribute to him.
Judge Mangan (67) told a packed courtroom: “It only remains for me to seek forgiveness to anyone I may have wronged or anyone who suffered through any mistake I made during my time on the bench. I appreciate that forgiveness might not be readily forthcoming but that’s not to stop me seeking it.”
Judge Mangan was appointed to the bench in 1984. He served as a moveable judge for 17 years before he was appointed the assigned judge for Clare in 2001.