A judge has ruled that jailed teacher Enoch Burke’s mother Martina and sister Ammi were in contempt of court by dint of their behaviour during a hearing last month.
Judge Brian Cregan found both women, who were not present for his ruling, were in contempt of court over their behaviour during a hearing on February 20th and directed they should be arrested and jailed for two weeks.
He said Ammi Burke’s behaviour was “disgraceful” for a solicitor and he intended to send papers to the Law Society to consider whether this should lead to disciplinary action.
It was long past time for the court to consider bringing a halt to the Burke “family circus”, he said, and he intended to direct that Ammi Burke, Martina Burke and Isaac Burke, a brother of Enoch Burke, should only be permitted to attend future proceedings remotely.
If the three objected to that intended order, they could make submissions within a week, he said.
At that point, Isaac Burke said his mother and sister were at their place of employment and the judge was wrong to bring their religious beliefs into the matter.
In his ruling earlier, the judge said this was “a paradigmatic case of contempt”. He said both women roared and shouted and interrupted during the hearing on February 20th and it had descended into chaos and had to be suspended.
The law applies to all who seek to interrupt the court proceedings and there is no exception on religious ideology or other grounds, he said. We live in a democracy governed by the rule of law and not a theocracy, he said.
The judge said previous efforts by the court to control the courtroom had not worked. He was of the view that both women should be sentenced to two weeks in prison.
He rejected their arguments that Enoch Burke was deprived of his rights and reiterated that he is in prison for disobeying court orders and has the keys “to his own prison”. The ideology of the Burke family is “a faith driven ideology which refuses to obey the rule of law”, he said.
There was “no excuse” and no justification for the outburst of shouting by Martina Burke during the hearing on February 20th, he said.
It was clear Martina Burke believes she has “the right to shout at any judge at any time”, the judge said.
She and other members of the family have been treated with “great forbearance” by the courts but this cannot continue, he added.
This behaviour was “a gross interference with the administration of justice” for reasons including up to 10 gardaí had to be present for every appearance.
Her repeated shouting and disruption of the court hearing on February 20th amounted to contempt of court, he said.
Dealing with Ammi Burke, he also concluded her “outburst” and interruption during the hearing was in contempt of court. Ammi Burke had advanced “absurd” propositions in answer to the claim of contempt and had lost all sense of professional propriety, he said. She had advanced no basis to find she was not in contempt of court.
The judge had said at a previous hearing he would consider whether the women were in contempt arising from their behaviour when he decided last month to strike out Enoch Burke’s challenge over the conduct by a disciplinary appeal panel of his appeal against his dismissal from Wilson’s Hospital School.
The judge agreed with the school that allowing the case to run was pointless because two members of the panel had resigned, on legal advice, after the challenge was initiated and the third would not sit as part of a reconvened panel.
When the contempt matter returned before him last week, the judge said the specific conduct at issue was repeated shouting at the court by Martina and Ammi Burke, repeated refusals to sit down despite warnings and interruption of the school’s submissions.
Martina Burke repeatedly insisted her “righteous” and “godly” son had been wrongly dismissed by the school and wrongly jailed due to his opposition to “transgender ideology”.
She accused Cregan of “covering up” in relation to the alleged conduct by the panel of his appeal. Her son had been “abused” and “mocked” at the panel hearing and denied his rights, she said.
Ammi Burke said the judge’s striking out of her brother’s challenge over the “shambolic” panel hearing was an “appalling abuse of power” by the court. The panel hearing was “abusive” of her brother and his right to cross-examine witnesses was “vehemently opposed”, she said.
Her brother has been denied his rights for 3½ years, she said, and she would not “sit silently by while constitutional rights are denied and lies are told in court”.
“You are one of 11 judges who have denied my brother his constitutional rights,” she told Cregan.
The three-member disciplinary appeals panel was appointed by the board of management of the Co Westmeath school where Burke taught until he was suspended in August 2022 pending a disciplinary process. The school later decided on his dismissal but he continues to be paid pending the outcome of his appeal.
After Enoch Burke successfully challenged the composition of an earlier panel convened to hear his appeal against the dismissal decision, the second panel was convened and heard his appeal on December 13th last.
The panel was due to give its recommendations to the school board on January 9th but, before that, Enoch Burke initiated his challenge over the conduct of the December hearing.