DPP man faces trial for ‘giving out murder case info’
AN employee of the Director of Public Prosecutions is to face a three-day trial accused of breaking the Official Secrets Act in connection with a murder trial.
Jonathan Lennon, 34, is charged with breaking the Act in relation to criminal proceedings resulting from the murder of Peter Butterly, a dissident republican.
Butterly was shot dead outside The Huntsman Inn in Gormanston, Co. Meath, in 2013.
It is alleged that on September 7, 2017, and the following day, at a place unknown in Dublin, without authorisation, Mr Lennon communicated with another person official information within the possession of the DPP, relating to the prosecution of individuals arising from the murder of Butterly on March 6, 2013.
The accused, a father of three, from Clonee, Dublin 15, faced his third hearing at Blanchardstown District Court yesterday.
He is charged with four offences contrary to Section Four and 13 of the Official Secrets Act 1963, as amended by Section 48 of the Freedom of Information Act 1997. Yesterday, Judge Gerard Jones ruled that sensitive prosecution evidence must not be given directly to the accused and that he can only look at it in his lawyer’s office.
An order for disclosure of prosecution evidence had been made at an earlier stage.
Judge Jones heard yesterday that the prosecution has furnished disclosure to Mr Lennon’s solicitor. However, a State solicitor explained, the evidence was to be released to Mr Lennon’s lawyer only.
Counsel for Mr Lennon made an application for the material to be released to the accused. The barrister submitted that the defence was unable to take instructions and that his client was entitled to view and analyse the evidence by himself.
However, the prosecution objected and said that due to the evidence’s sensitivity, it was released with certain conditions – but it certainly did not prevent the defence from taking instructions from Mr Lennon, it was contended.
The State solicitor said 80 to 90% of the material could be handed to the defendant directly, but not the remaining evidence, which was referred to by the judge as ‘precious’.
Judge Jones ruled that Mr Lennon can go to his solicitor’s office and ‘spend morning till night viewing this material’; however, he added that he did not want the evidence ‘out and about’.
The court heard it will be a three-day trial and that senior counsel are to be retained by both sides. The case will be listed again for mention in January.
Mr Lennon, dressed in jeans and an anorak, did not address the court yesterday.
Earlier, his solicitor Anne FitzGibbon had told the court that she had received CCTV footage, memos of interviews and telephone records. The court has heard the case involves alleged communications over two days.
At Mr Lennon’s previous hearing, he was granted legal aid after the court heard he worked for the DPP, but has been suspended from his job and was getting €400 a week.
He had a family and a mortgage, the solicitor submitted.
In July, at the Special Criminal Court, Dean Evans, 27, of Grange Park Rise, Raheny, Dublin, was given a mandatory life sentence for the murder of 35-year-old father-of-three Peter Butterly, who was from Dunleer, Co. Louth.
Evans was extradited from Spain earlier this year after he spent 18 months on the run.
Two other Dublin men are already serving life sentences for the murder, after being found guilty in March of this year.
Edward McGrath, 35, of Land Dale Lawns, Springfield, Tallaght, and Sharif Kelly, 47, of Pinewood Green Road, Balbriggan, had both denied the murder.
Two other men are awaiting trial later this year on the same murder charge.
‘Suspended from his job’