ON SUNDAY night the three party leaders in Government, John Bruton, Dick Spring and Proinsias De Rossa, issued a joint statement appealing for voters to vote Yes in tomorrow's referendum on bail.
The statement was a prime example of the wilful ignorance of the facts on crime and bail and of the cynical, opportunistic misrepresentation of the issues involved that has characterised this campaign.
The statement urged a Yes vote for nine reasons.
It would "set down an unequivocal marker for the hardened and persistent criminals in our society".
. It would "tip the balance against those who would commit serious criminal acts while on bail".
. It would "restore protection to the innocent victims of such crimes".
. This change was needed in the "fight against organised armed criminals and those involved in the drugs trade".
. It did not represent "a threat to the civil liberties of the Irish citizen".
. The refusal of bail will "only be possible if the offence of which the accused is charged in the first place is a really serious one
. "Extra prison spaces are being provided so that those remanded in custody will not displace those convicted of serious crime
. The change is necessary to prevent compulsive sex offenders offending while on bail.
. There has been "an unacceptable surge in the level and nature of serious crime".
Every one of these nine reasons is bogus. The proposed constitutional and legislative change in the bail laws will set neither an unequivocal nor equivocal "marker" for "hardened criminals", whether persistent or otherwise. That is if we understand "hardened criminals" to be those involved in crime such as murder, wounding and other acts endangering life, rape, sexual assault, kidnapping, carrying of firearms with criminal intent, armed robbery, arson, aggravated burglary and the making and possession of explosives.
The only information now available on the nature of crime committed by persons on bail is contained in the Law Reform Commission Report on Bail and relates to the years 1992 and 1993. This shows that in 1992 there were only five offences (three armed robberies, one rape, one assault) detected as having been committed by persons on bail that could reasonably be associated with "hardened criminals". In 1993 the figure was 15 (eight armed robberies, two rapes and five assaults).
Of course, "hardened criminals" committed far more than five offences in 1992 and 15 offences in 1993 and, no doubt, "hardened criminals" while on bail committed far more than five offences in 1992 and 15 offences in 1993.
But if no more than five "hardened criminal offences" were detected as having been committed by persons on bail in 1992 and 15 in 1993, how, conceivably, could the proposed change in the bail laws "set down an unequivocal marker" for them?
The claim that the proposed change in the bail laws could "tip the balance against those who would commit serious criminal acts while on bail" assumes that it is possible to predict reliably who would commit crimes while on bail and who would not.
Had the party leaders paid even scant attention to the Law Reform Commission Report on Bail they could hardly have made that assertion. This report states (page 77) that such predictions in other countries show "discouraging results ... about our ability to predict, at least when such studies concentrate on violent crime".
For the same reason the contention that the change would "restore protection to the innocent of such crimes (i.e. crimes committed by persons on bail)" is nonsense.
The claim that the change is needed in the "fight against organised armed criminals and those involved in the drugs trade" is a pure concoction. A tiny number of armed robberies has been detected as having been committed by sons on bail, and no serious drug-related crimes have been found to have been committed by persons on bail, apart from those committed by Tony Felloni, about whom there was a lot of fuss last June.
Felloni had been charged with drugs offences in August 1994 and granted bail. He was charged on a second drugs offence in January 1995 and again granted bail. A further drugs charge was brought against him in July 1995, when he was again granted bail. He was finally convicted on the original and subsequent charges in June 1996.
The Felloni case is no argument for a change in the bail laws. Had the courts and prosecutions systems been operated with even elementary efficiency, Felloni would have been sentenced to imprisonment long before he was charged with the second offence. The problem with Felloni was not that he was granted bail but that his trial was delayed for so long.
THE claim that the proposed changes do not represent "a threat to the civil liberties of the Irish citizen" is entirely disingenuous. Imprisoning people other than on conviction for crime is indubitably an encroachment on civil liberties. It might be argued that it is a justifiable encroachment, as is the detention of persons charged with a crime to ensure that they will not pervert the course of justice is a justifiable encroachment.
It is also disingenuous to pretend that the changes will apply only to a small category of "serious offences", when in reality it will apply to most criminal offences.
The claim about prison places is also bogus. Right away 400 extra prison places are needed to relieve overcrowding. Then about 300 places are needed to stop the present revolving-door arrangement. Several hundred more places would be needed if those who have broken bail and those "unlawfully at large" were locked up.
So, even if all the 800 new prison spaces were available immediately, it would still be necessary to let out convicted prisoners or let alone those "unlawfully at large" in order to imprison people who are legally and, in many instances, actually innocent.
The contention that this change is required to prevent recidivist sex-offending is also disingenuous. There is no evidence that persons on bail have committed serious sex offences of a kind associated with recidivism.
Finally, the contention that there has been a "surge in the nature of serious crime" is a further piece of codology. What could a "surge in the nature of serious crime" mean? Not a scintilla of evidence has been produced to show that there has been a "surge" in the level of serious crime and for good reason: there is no such evidence.
The other parties - Fianna Fail and the Progressive Democrats - have been no less reckless in the deployment of bogus claims about the level of crime and the cynical manipulation of the issues involved in the bail controversy.
Sock it to them. Vote No.