Upcoming Police State: New laws with e100 on the spot fines for being drunk in public

France is a mediterranean (sp) country. Instead of getting sloshed at the weekend, they stay slightly drunk 24/7.

In sweden alcohol is almost illegal. This is where the temperance movment was born! They're all a bunch of mega-prudes over there.

I hate to put down other people's countries, but if there's only a few places worse than us, Sweden is most definately one of them.

and btw, Sweden does actually have quite a problem with "alcohol related violence" and the like (even though they drink less......hmmmmm:rolleyes:).

Deleted User wrote: »

theyre HURTING the economy...forget that they could pay off the national debt in one night in Dublin using these laws!!

current public order laws have been with us for the past 14 years with significantly higher penalties when they end up in court compared to the on the spot fines. but the national debt still remains

just got home from the pub, it was a good night, met a great girl I knew years ago, nothing special, just the local, we had a few pints with the people iusually meet there. So anyways,at the endof the night we all left, and I walked with 3 others the 2K walk home. Eventually 'dick head' here decides to have a piss behind a lamppost on the street, patrol car passes, and then does a U-Turn, me does me flies up, and starts to walk with the others,car stopsbeside us and the guard asks me what i was doing (knowing already) me gets a bit of an embarrassing talking to, and no fine

so as regards this new law, in the immortal words of Corporal Jones 'Don't Panic'

monument wrote: »

TheNog: I'm glad you made me do a bit of research, this should make things clearer...

From the Shadow Report to the Third Periodic Report of Ireland under the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (June 08) published by FLAC (Free Legal Advice Centres), Irish Council for Civil Liberties, and Irish Penal Reform Trust (IPRT)...

I have never heard or read that report before but I appreciate you posting. Will look into it.

monument wrote: »

I'm still waiting for you to disprove the Irish Times and the BBC. And the above report backs them up.



It looks like this proves your lack of knowledge and understanding of the law. The Criminal Justice (Public Order) Act 1994 has been updated since it was enacted. (Simply looking up the text of one act yourself is too simplistic... Updates or additions to Acts are unlikely to be outlined in the original Act. While new or older acts, and/or SIs, and/or case law may also be factors)

Nevertheless, you will see that "Disorderly conduct in public place" is covered by section four while "disorderly conduct in public place" is covered separately by section five. The two combined is what I've been calling 'drunk and disorderly'.

With regards to the Irish Times and the BBC I was simply trying to show that both reports clearly show the Drunk and Disorderly was an offence which could/would give rise to an understanding of it being an offence which it isn't. Also peopple on this thread were begining to believe that anyone could be prosecuted just for being drunk which again is incorrect. A law like that would be pointless and counter-productive.

My knowledge of the Public Order Act is quite extensive as I have used it many times in the past (only as a last resort mind) to prosecute people and so I know parts of it have been amended but for simplicity purposes and to prevent the thread getting too bogged down in law so thats why I didn't want to go into amendments after amendments. The amendments that come to mind are the increases in maximum fines for Sections 6 & 8 from €625 to €1,000 and of course the introduction of on the spot fines.

I can see what you mean about drunk and disorderly and I accept that but again I was merely pointing out there is no offence called Drunk and Disorderly. The law and its use of is and has to be very specific although discussing it on boards.ie it possibly shouldn't.

monument wrote: »

At the end of section four note:

"intoxicated" means under the intoxicating influence of any alcoholic drink, drug, solvent or other substance or a combination of substances and cognate words shall be construed accordingly.

Thus intoxicated is a vague catch-all term. See the quoted section of the Shadow Report above for even more.

The end note of Section 4 does outline intoxication but the entire section has to be taken into consideration for the necessary proofs for a conviction. The key proofs are 1. drunk in a public place and 2. possibility of being a danger to himself or others. It is simply not good nor safe enough to arrest/issue on the spot fine to a person for simply being drunk.

monument wrote: »

I was wrong here. I've corrected my self as above.



Section four of the 'Criminal Justice (Public Order) Act, 1994'.



Yes, there is. Well, as explained above, it's two offences. It's a pritty common term.

Both of us agree with each but were merely trying to prove our arguements from either end. I believe the term drunk and disorderly came from an old British offence but could be wrong.

monument wrote: »

While it might not be court language, you'll find 1,000s and 1,000s of references to "drunk and disorderly" in state Agency documents, general reporting, court reporting etc etc etc (I'm referring to Irish examples in all cases).

I'm guessing it is now codified in sections 4 & 5 of the 1994 Act. But you should really ask the DPP or a criminal lawyer or expert about such. But asking would be more out of interest than something that needs to be known.

OK we can agree that drunk and disorderly is layman language but nothing more.

monument wrote: »

It's not incorrect to say one could be arrested/fined for just being drunk. The interpretation of section four and other parts of the public order act as laid out by the named report above should be again noted here...

222.The Criminal Justice (Public Order) Act 1994 introduced a broad range of public order offences which the Gardaí rely upon when policing demonstrations and public events.

The main difficulty with this Act is that its wording is extremely vague and it empowers the police with too much discretion. In addition, a number of sections go further by providing for strict liability offences [452] and fines for intoxication in a public place (section 4) and disorderly conduct in a public place (section 5).

...

[452] Strict liability for a crime is imposed without the necessity of proving mens rea with respect to one or more elements of the crime. Mens rea refers to the guilty state of mind that the prosecution must prove a defendant to have had at the time of committing a crime in order to secure a conviction.

Why are you using a report when we are talking about law? If you were in court for a public order offence the judge wouldn't even listen to you if you began talking about this report. It is simply a report nothing more and it does not give a proper interpretation of the said section. Please read the actual wording of Section 4 here

4.—(1) It shall be an offence for any person to be present in any public place while intoxicated to such an extent as would give rise to a reasonable apprehension that he might endanger himself or any other person in his vicinity.
[GA]

(2) A person who is guilty of an offence under this section shall be liable on summary conviction to a fine not exceeding £100.
[GA]

(3) Where a member of the Garda Síochána suspects, with reasonable cause, that an offence under this section or under section 5 or 6 is being committed, the member concerned may seize, obtain or remove, without warrant, any bottle or container, together with its contents, which—
[GA]

( a ) is in the possession, in a place other than a place used as a dwelling, of a person by whom such member suspects the offence to have been committed, and
[GA]

( b ) such member suspects, with reasonable cause, contains an intoxicating substance:
[GA]

Provided that, in the application of this subsection to section 5 or 6, any such bottle or container, together with its contents, may only be so seized, obtained or removed where the member of the Garda Síochána suspects, with reasonable cause, that the bottle or container or its contents, is relevant to the offence under section 5 or 6 which the member suspects is being committed.
[GA]

(4) In this section—
[GA]

"bottle or container" does not include a bottle or container for a substance which is in the possession of the person concerned for a purpose other than the intoxication of that or any other person;
[GA]

"intoxicated" means under the intoxicating influence of any alcoholic drink, drug, solvent or other substance or a combination of substances and cognate words shall be construed accordingly.

Anyways the problem I have with the above report where it states the Mens Rea does not have to proved for public order offences is how can anyone prove the criminal state of mind of a person when they are absolutely pissed drunk? The reality of it is that the most decent person can do something stupid with too much to drink and without any intention or recollection of their actions.

monument wrote: »

The reason I mentioned it is you were wrong to say our public order laws are 14 years old... but to be fair I was wrong on another matter as corrected in my last post.

Our current public order act is 14 years old despite some recent amendments. I am not talking any other public order acts which were repealed following the 1994 act. If you think I am wrong then tell me what year are is the current act?

monument wrote: »

However, you might want to note that a number of judges (one in Mayo comes to mind) have said they can no longer take the word of an officer alone in light of Garda wrongdoings.

But sections 4,5,6 & 8 usually require evidence from a Garda only. How feasible would it be for guards to take statements from possible witnesses who may be as intoxicated as the person being arrested. I realise that damage was caused by the likes of Donegal fiasco but I don't think a Judge should paint us all with the same brush. In fact oral evidence could then be questionable in all cases of criminal acts.

monument wrote: »

I would trust the interpretation by the groups who wrote the report more then I would trust my reading of the written law.

But Section 4 is written in simple terms and does not require any great interpretation. It is there in black and white.

monument wrote: »

The problem of this law (as with other sections of the public order acts), is it criminalises something that traditionally not criminal and it does this in a pre-emptive way.

You're going into Thought Police kind of laws Orwell predicted.

Normally you have to prove a criminal state of mind relating to an act. With this there is no criminal act. It is pre-emptive of an act. It criminalises a possable act... You would only have to prove is a criminal state of mind and as mentioned by the report you don't have to even do that!.

You said how does "anyone prove the criminal state of mind of a person when they are absolutely pissed drunk?"... how do you do so in a pre-emptive way without somebody being absolutely pissed drunk?

There may have been good intentions in putting place these public order acts, but at the end of the day such intentions were misguided.

Section 4 is not used to preempt a criminal act. It is a power to arrest a person for their own safety.

monument wrote: »

...Anyway you said...


I very much don't know what you mean by the "current act". The 1994 act is the one we're talking about... But the 2003 act could be seen more current?

Even if you just look at the 1994 act, the act may have been with us since then but it's simple not true to say "public order laws have been with us for the past 14 years" the act and the law has been updated, thus the law is not 14 years old (a statement which implies there has been no change in 14 years, there has).

Anyway, I'm getting into semantics here, but you seem to be asking for careful wording on wording on one side while using relaxed wording your self.

I have already stated the 1994 act was amended but it is still the Principal act and the amendments are not stand alone acts by themselves so yes our public order act is 14 yrs old.

monument wrote: »

Indeed, it goes further then I would. But at the same time oral evidence from one person/group against another person/group isn't strong to start with and there is an unhealthy over reliance on such which tends to cause problems from small cases to Donegal scale.

I agree it could be possible of gardai lying in the box while giving evidence but as far as I remember there is no evidence of that recently.

monument wrote: »

Just to qualify what I'm saying and my general view point: I am the type of person who will -- to my own inconvenience -- report crime to the police and who has -- to a large inconvenience -- made a statement about such crimes etc.

I applaud the time you have spent on giving statements and going to court etc. Fair play to you.

monument wrote: »

I'm not a nut who thinks the whole force are bent. At the same time I'm of the view of simply putting it down to "bad apples", is wrong -- you need system changes (some of which has been put in place) and I'd include removing/fixing laws which are open to a high level of abuse such as much of the public order acts.

There are 'bad apples' or people who abuse their position in the Gardai and I and many of my colleagues (that I know of) despise them to the highest. Systems and procedures are in place for the outing of these people which everyone (Gardai and the Public) hopes will work. If they don;t work then something else will be tried. Only time will tell but no one can say for sure something along the lines of Donegal will happen again but I sure hope not.

If the public order offences were to be taken off the statute books, what could we replace it with? Public order offences occur everyday of the week across the country. How could we tackle it?

monument wrote: »

Read what I said again:

With this there is no criminal act. It is pre-emptive of an act. It criminalises a possible act. [one which may or may not take place]

If somebody is at a state where they need to be arrested for their own safety they would/should be in a state of disorder, which is cover by section 5. There is no need for section 4 as a stand alone section.

There is a big difference between section 4 and 5. I think we can agree that section 4 is used when someone who is intoxicated is arrested for their own safety. Section 5 however is used when someone is acting in an offensive manner in public.
So there is a need for the two offences cos they with different types of behaviour.

monument wrote: »

Noting the above, can I again ask you to answer the following: You said how does "anyone prove the criminal state of mind of a person when they are absolutely pissed drunk?"... how do you do so in a pre-emptive way without somebody being absolutely pissed drunk (taking note that section four does not qualify intoxication / drunkenness in any way)?

ok its clear to me that you have not read the piece of legislation or don;t understand it but it clearly states intoxication is explained as a footnote.

monument wrote: »

In the first case you said: "current public order laws have been with us for the past 14 years," such is incorrect. Never mind tho as it's far from central to what we're talking about.

How can you say that? I have prosecuted many people for public order so are you saying that all the charge sheets and summons I have served are wrong? I think if they were a judge would have picked up on it tbh.

Bambi wrote: »

Depends on what you class as evidence really.

If you are talking about the evidence given in the box it is called oral evidence but if you are talking about evidence of corruption or lying under oath then afaik there is no recent evidence of corruption.