‘It’s not trespassing to turn up at your place of work’
As Enoch Burke continues to turn up at school, his former employer will today try to sequester his assets
TEACHER Enoch Burke will today learn if he will be fined or have his assets temporarily seized as a penalty for disobeying court orders.
The judgment listed by High Court judge Brian O’Moore comes as Mr Burke has continued to attempt to teach at Wilson’s Hospital School, despite his dismissal from his role last week.
Yesterday he stood for several hours outside the Co. Westmeath facility, where staff refused to allow him inside the building.
He arrived shortly before 9am, and was driven away by his father after the school day ended.
Mr Burke had been arrested under public order legislation following his appearance at the school on Tuesday.
He was released following his arrest, which he said related to an allegation of trespass ‘likely to cause fear’.
As he promptly returned to the school, gardaí confirmed that they were preparing a file to be sent to the Director of Public Prosecutions (DPP).
Judge O’Moore is now responding to an application brought by the school earlier this month, when Mr Burke attended the school in defiance of a court order that he stay away while he was on suspension.
The order followed disciplinary proceedings, which began after he refused a request by the school that he refer to a transitioning student by their chosen name and the pronoun ‘they’.
He insisted that it went against his Christian beliefs.
Mr Burke spent three months in prison for contempt of court in disobeying the same order to stay away from the school last term. He claimed that the order was invalid, as it did not acknowledge his constitutional right to practise his religion.
The school has since told the court it did not want to pursue a further term of imprisonment for Mr Burke, but that it was seeking to sequester his assets.
It also told the judge that he had the option of a fine, under the rarely used rules governing such a continued contempt of court.
In a letter to Mr Burke which emerged over the weekend, the student council told him that his ongoing attendance at the school was causing huge disruption, and that it was affecting learning as well as being a daily reminder to LGBTQI+ students of the prejudice they experienced.
However, in a speech made to reporters outside the Wilson’s Hospital School gates on Tuesday, Mr Burke continued to insist that he had a right to be there.
He said: ‘It is not trespassing to turn up at your place of work.
‘I am an employee here and even the purported disciplinary meeting last week, that was conducted unlawfully… even that purported meeting with its purported dismissal wasn’t to take effect for months.’
He continued: ‘And then when it comes to “likely to cause fear”, that is an absolutely preposterous statement. It’s absolutely reprehensible that I would ever do such a thing, that I would ever put fear into anybody.
‘All of this is because I won’t accept transgenderism. It’s absolutely preposterous, it’s really very sad. It’s really terrible and that’s why I’m here.
‘I’m here to do my work, as every teacher in the country and every civil servant and every employee has an absolute right to do.’
‘Causing huge disruption’