Addressing vulnerability in Ireland’s criminal justice system: A survey of recent statutory developments

Abstract

For over a quarter of century Ireland’s statutory special measures framework, as originally enacted by the Criminal Evidence Act 1992, remained largely unchanged, falling beyond the reformative gaze of successive Irish governments. This period of political inertia, however, came to an abrupt end in 2017 when Irish policymakers, motivated by developments at a European Union level, introduced two landmark legislative instruments which promised to reimagine the availability and diversity of Ireland’s store of statutory testimonial accommodations, namely the Criminal Law (Sexual Offences) Act 2017 and the Criminal Justice (Victims of Crime) Act 2017. By interrogating these newly-commenced instruments in light of the experience of crime victims with intellectual disabilities, this paper surveys the current procedural landscape governing the treatment of vulnerable crime victims in Ireland and is intended to go some way towards exposing the embedded evidential barriers which continue to prejudice efforts aimed at securing their best evidence in court.