NCJ Number
150535
Date Published
1994
Length
19 pages
Annotation
This bulletin presents statistics on the operation of Northern Ireland's Emergency Provisions Act 1991 for 1993.
Abstract
It also provides information from previous years for comparison. The Emergency Provisions Act provides the police and army with additional powers to deal with terrorism and facilitates the trial of certain terrorist-type offenses in the Crown Court by a judge sitting without a jury ("Diplock Courts"). The act further provides for the payment of compensation for damage caused to private property under the act, the regulation of the private security industry, and the provision of statutory rights for terrorist suspects in police custody. Data show that 447 persons were tried for terrorist-type offenses in the "Diplock" courts; 328 (73 percent) pleaded guilty, and 413 (92 percent) were found guilty. The acquittal rate for persons pleading not guilty was 29 percent; 119 persons pleaded not guilty and 34 were acquitted. Fifty percent of applications for bail for scheduled offenses were granted. There were 853 applications made to the attorney general for offenses to be certified out of the scheduled mode of trial, of which 572 were successful. For those remanded in custody for scheduled offenses in 1993, the average waiting times were 28.3 weeks remand to committal, 8.3 weeks committal to arraignment, and 28 weeks arraignment to hearing. 13 tables