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A v The Governor of Arbour Hill Prison 2006
A v. The governor of Arbour Hill Prison IESC 45 was a landmark Irish Supreme Court case where the applicant was convicted in the Circuit Criminal Court of unlawful carnal knowledge contrary to s.1(1) of the Criminal Law Amendment Act 1935 which is used for legislation in Ireland to amend the criminal law. The appellant was subsequently sentenced to three years. The defendant sought release from custody pursuant to Article 40.4.1 of the constitution. Article 40.4.1 of the constitution states that no person should be deprived of his or her personal liberty in accordance to law. The applicant argued that his conviction was unlawful on the basis that the Supreme Court declared s. 1(1) of the Criminal Law (Amendment) Act 1935 to be inconsistent with the Constitution. The applicant's conviction was upheld under this offence.

Background
This case challenged the constitution as the appellant was arrested under the wrong constitution. The Supreme Court followed through previous cases which this issue was faced. The applicant was first convicted before the Dublin Circuit Court on the 15th June, 2004. He was charged on the offence of unlawful carnal knowledge contrary to s.1(1) of the Criminal Law Act 1935 which was followed by a plea of guilty on his behalf. He was sentenced to three years imprisonment on the 24th November 2004.

In a similar case C.C. v Ireland, the court took a different approach and declared that s.1(1) of the Criminal Law (Amendement) Act 1935 was inconsistent with the provisions of the Constitution. This judgement was made on 23rd May 2006.

The applicant appealed to the High Court. After the hearing of that appeal, the court came to the decision to let him go as his conviction was lawful. His appeal was allowed.

Case
In this case the applicant pleaded guilty of statutory rape of a 12 year old girl. He was sentenced to prison for three years. On the basis of the C.C case the applicants conviction was invalid and he was released on High Court grounds. A national scandal was ensued, and the Supreme Court of Ireland issued a re-arrest and upheld the validity of conviction. After months of deliberation in the Supreme Court, A was convicted for 'collateral attack' on verdict which he was not already been convicted of.

Judgement
The final judgement of this controversial case was made by Murray C.J on the 10th of July 2006 .Murray C.J referred to Griffin J's statement in in Murphy v Attorney General [1982] I.R. 241 who said "“… [T]he fact that a provision was held to be no longer in force since 1937 does not automatically carry the corollary that what has been done under and in pursuance of that provision after the Constitution came into force will necessarily be condemned for lack of validity”. He also reffered to Henchy J's statement in The State (Byrne) v Frawley [1978] I.R. 326 at 349 who said “… [I]t does not necessarily follow that Court Orders lack binding force because they were made in proceedings based on an unconstitutional statute”: From these cases and judgement's and previous decisions, Murray C.J. concluded that even though the decisions were that the provision of an Act is unconstitutional, the crime of the appellant should not be over looked. The judgements of Murray C.J., Denham J., McGuinness J., Hardiman J., and Geoghegan J. all concluded that "laws should be observed until they were struck down as unconstitutional".

Constitutional Amendments
In this case the Supreme Court over ruled the High courts decision. The Supreme Court refused to go wtih invalidity and instead placed more emphasis on the courts role in administering justice and promoting common good. There were two decisions in this case. The first decision which was made by the high court was to follow the rules of the constitution and obey the law. The High Court did this as the appellant was convicted under a non-existing Constitution and let A free. The Supreme Court demanded a re-arrest after this as they did not want to let someone who committed a crime be set free, to them they're duty was to protect the public and do it for the common good. The case is significant as the Supreme Court departed from the usual rule of law which states that the duty of law is not to "pronounce a new law but to maintain and expand the old one" and certainly exemplifies the problems of the distinction between the Constitution and judicial enforcement of commands.In this case the Supreme Court has adopted a stance that goes beyond limiting the retrospective effect of declaration of invalidity.