Sir, - Your home news reports of April 15th carried two reports from the Dublin Circuit Criminal Court. Justice Frank O'Donnell stated in his court that criminals were committing "a gross abuse of the jury system" by changing their pleas prior to trial, and undermining the public's confidence in the legal system.
On the same page in another case, Judge Kieran O'Connor advised the jury in the Dublin Criminal Court that they should not be critical of the defendant's decision to change his plea (only minutes before his trial) as he was well within his rights! Surely a case of the judiciary not singing from the same hymn sheet. - Yours, etc.,
John O'Connor, Vernon Grove, Rathgar, Dublin 6.