Father and son lose bid to swerve 'unfair' €2k Covid fine for travelling to Dublin Airport
The father and son were stopped at the airport(Image: UCG/Universal Images Group via Getty Images)A father and son have lost an appeal over their failed High Court challenge to €2,000 fixed penalty notices they received for allegedly breaching Covid regulations by travelling to Dublin Airport in 2021.Nicolae and Florin Mazarache, of Clondalkin, Dublin, were travelling to Spain to visit family members on April 17, 2021, when they were stopped at the airport by a garda.They were later issued with the notices alleging they had "committed an offence of movement of persons" at a port or airport contrary to the 1947 Health Act (as amended).A fixed payment of €2,000 was applied and if not paid within 28 days they would have to go before the District Court where, if convicted, could face a fine of up to €4,000 and/or one month's imprisonment, or both.The Mazaraches, of Lealand Meadows, Clondalkin, Dublin, chose not to pay the fixed penalty but instead brought judicial review proceedings.They claimed, among other things, there was a fundamental unfairness in the failure of the fixed notices they received to either specify or particularise the offence they were alleged to have committed.They contended the notices were invalid and the State should be restrained for any offence arising out of their failure to make the fixed payments.The respondents, the Garda Commissioner, the DPP and the Minister for Health, opposed the challenge.In February 2024, the High Court dismissed their challenge and also lifted an injunction halting their prosecution in the District Court.The Mazaraches appealed and in a decision on behalf of the three-judge Court of Appeal (CoA), Ms Justice Nuala Butler dismissed the appeal.She said the core arguments made on behalf of the Mazaraches was that the High Court erred fundamentally in treating the complaints made by them regarding the fixed notices as matters which could and should be dealt with by the District Court at trial.The State parties, opposing the appeal, contended that a defective notice does not deprive the District Court of jurisdiction to embark on the hearing of the criminal charges.Ms Justice Butler said it would be counter-productive in policy terms to have issues falling properly within the jurisdiction of the District Court determined on a pre-emptive basis by the High Court in response to judicial review proceedings issued before any criminal prosecution begins.She believed the High Court judge was correct. An error in a notice which the prosecutor is not obliged to serve cannot, in her view, deprive the prosecutor of the entitlement to bring the prosecution nor the District Court of jurisdiction to hear it.Subscribe to our newsletter for the latest news from the Irish Mirror direct to your inbox: Sign up here.
