‘If serial burglars want bail – they should be tagged’
PERSISTENT burglars should be made to wear electronic ankle bracelets if they want to get out on bail, Fianna Fáil said yesterday.
Monitoring tags have been available in Ireland for more than a decade, but have rarely, if ever, been used, said party Justice spokesman Jim O’Callaghan.
The level of violent crime in Ireland – as witnessed by recent events – is now such as to warrant the denial of bail to repeat offenders, especially in cases of aggravated burglary, he said yesterday.
There are very high levels of recidivism, or repeat offending, among those imprisoned for burglary. Four in five (79%) carry out further break-ins as soon as they are released.
And in 2016, more than one crime in every eight (13%) is known to have been committed by a person who was out on bail in relation to another criminal offence. An investigation by RTÉ Investigates found that more than 300,000 crimes have been committed in the past 13 years by criminals who were on bail. This works out at almost 2,000 crimes committed per month, or an astonishing 63 a day.
‘The Government doesn’t see the seriousness of crime,’ said Mr O’Callaghan in advance of second stage debate on his Bail (Amendment) Bill 2017 which seeks to address the high levels of repeat offending among those out on bail.
Mr O’Callaghan said the bail referendum in 1996 had enabled the refusal of bail where a court held the opinion there was the danger of another offence, and it was time it was applied widely to burglary cases.
‘Over 70% of burglaries and aggravated burglaries are committed by those with previous convictions. We say that the court shall refuse bail if it is reasonably necessary to protect the commission of a future offence.
‘As an alternative, a burglary accused could agree to bail on the condition that they agree to electronic monitoring. It hasn’t been used to any real extent, and we believe it is now a necessary response to escalating levels of crime. We have the empirical evidence, and we should act on it.’
He said he didn’t see electronic tagging as a ‘draconian measure’, and it would be to the benefit of an accused, rather than seeing them incarcerated. For this reason, he did not see the power to refuse bail in burglary cases resulting in a dramatic increase in the number of people in jail.
FF TD Lisa Chambers said big crowds of concerned citizens were attending meetings on rural crime around the country. ‘Burglary and aggravated burglary are not being taken seriously enough. We need to get tough on crime. We’re either serious or we’re not serious about addressing the issue, and Fianna Fáil is serious.’
Meanwhile, Mr O’Callaghan snapped back at Transport Minister Shane Ross after the latter complained that the only people resisting his Judicial Appointments Bill were lawyers. Mr O’Callaghan is a senior counsel.
‘The reason I’m against it is that it’s a really silly idea,’ Mr O’Callaghan said, adding that it would give majority control in the appointment of judges to people who don’t have knowledge of the subject at hand. ‘The Government is asleep at the wheel and is prepared to do anything that keeps him [Shane Ross] onside,’ Mr O’Callaghan added, claiming he didn’t want to personalise the issue.
Mr Ross had a problem with politicians appointing people to the bench, but now he was ‘going to start hitting judges as well’, he added, saying the concession to the leader of the Independent Alliance reflected badly on the Taoiseach and Government.
300,000 offences committed on bail ‘Crimes not being taken seriously’