The High Court has reserved judgment on an action by retired Dublin assistant county manager, Mr George Redmond, to stop his trial on alleged corruption charges from proceeding before Dublin Circuit Criminal Court.
At the conclusion of a two-day hearing yesterday, Mr Justice Kearns said he hoped to deliver his decision no later than November 8th.Because of extensive media coverage of his affairs and conduct, Mr Redmond (78) claims it would not be possible for him to be tried by an impartial and unbiased jury. A large number of copies of newspaper coverage and transcripts of radio broadcasts relating to Mr Redmond have been given to the court by his lawyers. In submissions for the DPP, Mr Patrick Gageby SC, said many of the articles referred to had appeared before Mr Redmond had been charged. The application before the court had been moved 10 weeks after a trial date had been fixed and five weeks before the trial was due. One of the difficulties was that it meant the trial had had to be vacated.
The reality was that Mr Redmond had refrained from moving his application when the litigation could have been decided before the trial date had been fixed, counsel said.