This article is from page 9 of the 2011-12-13 edition of The Clare People. OCR mistakes are to be expected so download the original SWF or the rendered page 9 JPG
EAST Clare district court sittings are to return to Killaloe for a trial period of three months.
O’Donovan’s bar and restaurant, Derg Court, Ballina, Killaloe, will host the sittings from January 3.
The court will sit on the first Tuesday of every month and will also sit on extra days – on the six second Tuesdays (January, March, May, July, October and December). It will sit at O’Donovan’s for three months initially, with the option of extending the lease on a monthly basis.
The announcement by the Courts Service came after a series of temporary measures in relation to a court venue for Killaloe. The court had sat at the Lakeside Hotel for a number of years. It emerged last year that the Lakeside would not be a long-term option. It was then moved to the Kincora Hotel after months of searching for a venue by the Courts Service.
However the Kincora Hotel went into receivership and a decision was then taken to move the September, October, November and December sittings of the court to Ennis Courthouse.
The old courthouse in Killaloe is in a state of disrepair and funding is not available to renovate it.
The Courts Service has said at all times that the aim was to secure a permanent venue for the East Clare court sittings. Court sittings in Tulla and Scarriff are a thing of the past after a decision was taken to move all east Clare cases to Killaloe, a few years ago. Both members of the legal profession and gardaí have said that it would be a bad move to have the east Clare sittings in Ennis in the long-term and say that a permanent move to Ennis isn’t something that should be contemplated.
The decision on the venue for Killaloe comes amid widespread changes to court sittings across the county, which will come into effect in the New Year.
As revealed in The Clare People last month, there are proposals to centralise the service.
Under the changes, there will be specific dates for crime hearings, separate dates for civil hearings and other listed dates for hearings related to traffic offences. Criminal cases will be heard on Wednesdays, while traffic and civil cases will go before the presiding judge on Fridays.
Also, most of the hearings will be centralised to Ennis. While Kilrush cases will continue to be heard in the West Clare town, cases from North Clare are to be moved to Ennis. Shannon cases are already heard in Ennis.