School seeks orders that could see sacked teacher Enoch Burke jailed again
Wilson’s Hospital School in Co Westmeath has asked the High Court for orders that could see Enoch Burke jailed for the third time for contempt of court.
During yesterday’s vacation sitting of the court, the school’s board of management, represented by Rosemary Mallon BL, secured permission to bring a motion seeking the Co Mayo teacher’s attachment and possible committal to prison arising out of his alleged failure to comply with a permanent injunction to stay away from the school.
The board made its latest application after the teacher, who is currently appealing against a decision to dismiss him from his job, started attending the grounds of the school in recent days.
Counsel said that since last Thursday, August 22, the board has become anxious after Mr Burke started returning to the school, in breach of the terms of the injunction that prevents him from trespassing there.
The matter came before Mr Justice Barry O’Donnell, who on an ex parte basis granted the school permission to serve short notice of the attachment and committal proceedings on Mr Burke. The matter will return before the court tomorrow.
The German and history teacher was released without purging his contempt in late June from Mountjoy Prison, where he has spent more than 400 days in two different spells, He was warned at the time by Mr Justice Mark Sanfey that the courts would have “no hesitation” in sending him back to prison if he was again found to have breached the court’s order.
Mr Burke has been in a continuing legal dispute with Wilson’s Hospital School over what he claims was his refusal in 2022 to comply with its direction to call a then student by a different name and use the pronoun “they”.
Throughout this legal battle, Mr Burke has claimed he has been imprisoned because he was being punished for his religious beliefs and his opposition to “transgenderism”.
He denies all claims of wrongdoing against him and says his constitutional rights were breached by the school’s direction that he refer to a student by a different gender.
Mr Burke was last jailed early last September over his refusal to comply with the permanent injunction, made the previous May by Mr Justice Alex Owens. He did not appeal against that order to the Court of Appeal, but did make an application earlier this year to the High Court seeking to set aside the injunction on the grounds that it was flawed and unconstitutional. That application was dismissed.
During his first spell behind bars, he spent more than 100 days in Mountjoy, between September and December 2022. He was released in December 2022 without purging his contempt. Following his suspension from his teaching position in August 2022, Mr Burke was sued by the school over his failure to comply with a previous court order that required him to stay away while he was suspended from his job
He started attending at the school after the Christmas holidays, and the High Court imposed a daily fine of €700 on him. However, arising out of his failure to stay away when the 2023-24 school year started, Mr Burke was again jailed for contempt.