Longford needs 'its own full-time judge' to get through trial backlog

Longford Circuit Court Judge Keenan Johnson has remarked that Longford needs its own judge if it is to get through the major backlog of trials.

The October sittings of Longford Circuit Court commenced this morning and trials will commence next Tuesday in Mullingar.

However, due to the suspension of jury trials during the Covid-19 pandemic, there is now a significant backlog of trials to get through and limited time during Circuit Court sittings to deal with them.

At this morning's court sitting, as a large number of three to four day trials were up for mention, Judge Johnson expressed his opinion on the impossibility of all trials being heard in a timely manner.

"On the basis of what's going on here this morning, it seems Longford would need a full time Circuit Court judge to deal with all these trials," he said.

"I would be of a mind to write to the president to request he assign a judge to this town to deal with this backlog."