Human rights of terror offenders not breached by cross-border notification regime: Court of Appeal

Senior judges rejected claims the enhanced regime unlawfully interferes with their private lives or discriminates against them on grounds of nationality.

“They face notification requirements not because they are Irish or resident in NI,” Chief Justice Dame Siobhan Keegan said.

“It is because they have been found to pose sufficient risk to national security that they are subject to additional preventative measures in order to minimise the likelihood of terrorist attack.”

Amendments within the Counter-Terrorism and Border Security Act 2019 introduced an obligation to alert the PSNI, regardless of reasons for crossing the border or time to be spent in the Republic.

All Registered Terrorist Offenders must provide a range of information, including details of their planned travel outside the UK, for periods of at least 10 years.

Three of those subjected to the duty were seeking to overturn a High Court ruling that the new regime is a legitimate step aimed at protecting the public.

Anthony Lancaster, Anthony McDonnell and Sharon Rafferty, also known as Sharon Jordan, challenged the fairness and rationality of the obligation.

In 2015 Lancaster, from Creggan, received a 12-month suspended sentence for acting as master of ceremonies at a 32 County Sovereignty Movement event.

The 61-year-old was convicted of assisting in arranging or managing a meeting to be addressed by a person who belonged or professed to belong to a proscribed organisation.

The offence related to an Easter Rising commemoration in April 2012.

Lancaster regularly made short trips to Donegal to visit relatives and friends, transport his son to work, buy diesel and follow Derry City FC.

He claimed the new requirement to provide seven days advance notification has caused anxiety and prohibited spur of the moment travel, breaching private and family life entitlements protected by Article 8 of the European Convention on Human Rights.

It was also contended that RTOs faced discrimination based on their status as residents in Northern Ireland or associated with a national minority.

Similar arguments were advanced by two others among a cohort of less than 60 RTOs.

Rafferty, 48, from Dungannon, received an eight-year sentence in 2014 for offences including possession of a firearm and preparation of terrorist acts in connection with a dissident republican training camp.

McDonnell, with a previous address in Ballymurphy, was convicted of five counts of having information likely to be of use to terrorists in 2013.

The 54-year-old was found to be in possession of security force members' vehicle registrations.

He served half of a three years and six months sentence.

Earlier this year the High Court held that the amended regime is a proportionate attempt to deal with the threat from terrorism.

Challenging that decision, counsel for the RTOs contended it was a disproportionate interference on the lives of those who have served their sentences.

Lawyers representing the Home Office and PSNI argued the amended regime is a necessary response to the grave danger posed by terrorist activity.

The Court of Appeal dismissed all grounds of challenge.

Despite recognising the additional impact on Lancaster, Dame Siobhan held: “Even in a recognised exceptional case, the RTO regime is not so onerous as to entirely prohibit travel.”