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GAZETTE
JULY/AUGUST 1991
BEYOND ANY REASONABLE
DOUBT?
[by Kenneth E. L. Deale, Gill &
McMillan, 1990. £6.99].
This book of Irish murder trials was
first published in 1960 by the late
Mr. Justice Kenneth Deale, a Circuit
Court judge on the Eastern Circuit
for many years before being
elevated to the High Court towards
the end of his long judicial career.
This was Judge Deale's second
book of that genre, the first being
MEMORABLE IRISH TRIALS.
To older legal practitioners, Judge
Deale is better known as the author
of the seminal work on the Irish
Landlord & Tenant Act 1931. His
son, Julian, has followed in his
father's footsteps with his recent
book on Irish Landlord & Tenant
Law. Julian has also written the
foreword to the 1990 re-publication
of BEYOND ANY REASONABLE
DOUBT?
Among the ten murder trials des-
cribed and analysed in detail (of
varying gruesomeness), is the trial
of David O'Shea in 1931, for the
murder of Helen Sullivan at
Rathmore on the Cork/Kerry border.
This trial is memorable for one
particular incident where, after a
number of gardaf had visited the
suspect's house, all but one left,
the one hiding himself under a
bed from where he allegedly heard
an incriminating conversation
between the suspect and his
sister.
Another of the trials described is
entitled the Malahide Mystery (A.G.
-v- Henry McCabe), when, in March
1926, 'La Mancha', the Malahide
residence of the McDonnell family,
was set alight after the murder in
it of no less than six people. Parts
of the ruin of 'La Mancha' remain
visible to this day.
All in all, a very easy, if
necessarily morbid, read. Because
they are all Irish cases, the Irish
reader will probably feel a sense of
identification with the 'locus-in-
quo' of each crime, whether that
'locus' be in rural Cork, Kerry, Louth
or Roscommon or in urban
Booterstown, Drumcondra or
Rathmines. Also, those familiar
with today's criminal process will
be conscious of the much shorter
time that elapsed in those times
gone by between the arrest and
charging of the accused and the
trial by judge and jury; and,
following conviction, the hearing of
the subsequent appeal by the Court
of Criminal Appeal; and (where it
occurred) the execution of the
convicted murderer. Nowadays, the
wheels of justice grind much more
slowly, if more humanely in terms
of the untimate outcome. Obliquely,
Mr. Justice Deale, by highlighting
areas of doubt in some of the
cases, was an advocate of the
abolition of that most final of legal
conclusions, the death penalty.
•
Michael V. O'Mahony
NORDIC STUDIES IN
INFORMATION TECHNOLOGY
AND LAW
Edited by P. Blume. [Kluwer, 1991,
xii + 223 pp. Dfl 90, - /US$54
(excl. VAT)]
The Nordic countries comprise
small jurisdictions, Sweden,
Finland, Denmark, Iceland and
Norway. Their legal traditions
emphasise statutory law, but they
are not civil law countries. Court-
made law is important but these
countries cannot be classified as
case-law jurisdictions. The Danish,
Swedish and Norwegian languages
are sufficiently similar for com-
munication to be carried out
without interpretation.
Legal informatics plays an im-
portant part in the legal studies of
the Nordic lawyer.
(a) the production, storage,
retrieval and use of legal
information in all its forms,
(b) the implementation of com-
puter technology and the
implications of its use for the
duties and working pro-
cedures of lawyers, the courts
and public corporations;
(c) the implementation of com-
puter technology and the
implications of its use for a
reform of the general doc-
trines and recommended
interpretations of different
fields within law, and
(d) changes in legislation neces-
sitated by the implementation
and use of computers.
The book opens with an article
on "The Right to Know" by Peter
Seipel, Professor of legal infor-
matics at the University of
Stockholm. He argues for an
"adequate openness structure"
making a new level of participatory
democracy
possible.
Ahti
Saarenpaa writes on "Computers
and Legal Life". Peter Blume, the
editor, writes on legal information
systems. Jon Bing, Professor of
legal informatics at the University
of Oslo, writes on rules and
representation. The fifth article is
entitled "Problems of description in
Computer Tort Law". Data
protection, the methods of
teaching legal informatics at the
different Nordic universities and a
description of the legal information
service in the Nordic countries are
also described.
This book forms part of Kluwer's
Computer/Law series. Dr. Robert
Clark, Statutory Lecturer in Law,
University College, Dublin is on the
distinguished international board of
editors.
Telecommunication technology
will soon function as the backbone
and nervous system of national and
international commerce. Yester-
day's legal arrangements (still
applicable in Ireland) have lost and
will continue to lose relevance in
the face of modern modes of
telecommunication.
Eamonn G. Hall
A G E N T
I N
A U S T R A L I A
Melbourne firm Includes Irish
Solicitor practicing In Australia (five
jeers) seeks egencj work/linkege
with Irish Lawyers. We cover
Company and Commercial Law,
Property, Tax, Finance,
Immigration, Litigation and Probate
matters. Contact •
Jimmy
Lardner.
Lardner & Associates
100 Mt Eliza Way,
Mt Eliza, Victoria. Australia
Phone: 16-61 37874511
Fax: 16-61 37879799
251