Longford District Court judge rejects suggestion of ‘some form of collusion’

A drunk driver who contested a charge brought before Longford District Court was banned from the road for two years by Judge Bernadette Owens.

Thomas Grennan (63) of Tonymore, Mohill, Leitrim pleaded not guilty to a charge that on Tuesday, December 22, 2020 he drove a vehicle while exceeding the legal alcohol limit.

The first prosecution witness, Garda Justin Brown, outlined details of his patrol that brought him in contact with the defendant. A white Mitsubishi vehicle driven by Mr Grennan was stopped at Currabawn, Drumlish at 4:45pm.
Garda Brown said this was the second interaction with the defendant as earlier in the day, at 2:10pm, while undertaking a Covid inspection in a Drumlish public house he saw the defendant consuming alcohol.

When Garda Brown saw the vehicle in traffic he believed he had reasonable grounds to suspect an offence was taking place if Mr Grennan was the driver. The officer told the court that as the vehicle was in a row of traffic he activated the blue light and sirens and pulled in, in front of it.

While speaking to the driver he noted a strong smell of intoxication liquor and formed the opinion the defendant was committing an offence. Mr Grennan was arrested and conveyed to Longford Garda station. En route he was asked for his driver's licence and insurance, he presented a full licence and later his insurance documentation.
The officer in charge, Garda David Buckley spoke to the defendant, undertook a 20 minute period of observation, however the Evidenzer (the forensic breath-alcohol analyser) could not be operated.

The on duty doctor was called and a blood sample was taken. This later returned a reading of 182mg of blood for 100 millilitres of blood.
Under cross examination by counsel for the defendant, Liam O’Connell BL, Garda Brown rejected the suggestion there were a number of “striking similarities” between the specific order of words and the patter formatting of the statement by the two officers on duty.

In his evidence Garda Buckley explained the Evidenzer machine would not let him input data and so he was unable to use it to analyse the breath specimen. For this reason he called the out of hours doctor to take the blood sample.
Garda Buckley was the only officer on shift at the time who was a trained Evidenzer operator. The officer told the court he informed the Traffic Sergeant and the matter was rectified.
Reserve Garda Derek Francis was called as a witness by the defence. The Garda Reserve told the court he prepared his statement from the custody records, the notes on pulse and his own memory. Garda Francis has been a reserve since 2008 and has worked with Garda Brown for 10 years.

The witness refuted the suggestion by the defendant's counsel, Mr O’Connell, that the statement was “copy and pasted”. He pointed out his statement was a page and a half while Garda Brown's was over four pages.
“There are similarities because they are two accounts of the same incident,” the officer said.
In his closing statement Mr O'Connell pointed out the defence had to call the reserve Garda to give evidence as the State had not made him a witness.

In his closing statement Inspector Dave Jordan said the State's case was based on the evidence of the full time Garda: “The reserve Garda was not called because he must take a day off his own full time work to attend court,” he explained.
The inspector spoke of “a standard way of writing up a statement” used by all Gardai. Inspector Jordan said just because the same phrases are used by different Gardaí does not mean they copied each other.
Having reviewed the evidence Judge Bernadette Owens said she was not satisfied the defence reached the threshold to suggest there was some form of collusion in the compilation of the statement.

Mr O'Connell asked the judge to consider a number of mitigating factors. The defendant had no previous convictions and is an unmarried man who lives in a rural area.
The barrister said Mr Grennan draws hay for a living and a driving ban will impact on his ability to do this job. He pointed out the defendant has no formal education.
Among the factors Judge Owens said she would take into account were the defendant's previous good character and the implication of the driving ban.

The judge noted Mr Grennan's livelihood depends on his driving licence. Judge Owens imposed a fine of €800 with five month to pay and disqualified him for two years. Recognisance was set in the defendant's own bond of €250.