LAST UPDATE | 30 Oct

PRESIDENT MICHAEL D Higgins has signed a presidential pardon for two men who were executed in Co Kerry over 140 years ago. 

Sylvester Poff and James Barrett were convicted of the murder of Thomas Browne in October 1882 and were both executed in Tralee Gaol in January 1883.

However, an expert report found that there was no direct evidence against the two men and that the case rested on the circumstantial and contradictory evidence of one witness.

Earlier this year, the Government recommended to the President that he exercise his right to pardon on the grounds their convictions were unsafe. 

Speaking at the time, Justice Minister Helen McEntee said a pardon was “a rare occurrence” and that “both men were wrongfully convicted and suffered the harshest penalty under the law of the time in what can now be attributed to a miscarriage of justice”.

Today’s event in Áras an Uachtaráin marked only the seventh and eighth times a pardon has been granted in Ireland since 1937, and only the fourth and fifth to happen posthumously.

Sylvester Poff was aged 38 at the time of his execution and James Barrett was aged 24. 

Mr Poff’s great grandson Tomo Burke was in attendance this afternoon, as well as representatives of the Castleisland District Heritage Group that raised awareness of the case and worked with the Department of Justice on the pardon process.

Speaking this afternoon, President Higgins said that the case has been a long standing concern for the people of Kerry and that there was a strong local belief in the two men’s innocence, both before and after their execution.

“While we at this remove cannot undo what happened, we do have the power to acknowledge that what happened to Sylvester Poff and James Barrett was a great wrong,” he said.

I am pleased to be able to formally grant a Presidential Pardon to each of the men today, and to at least set the record straight. I hope that my doing so will bring a sense of closure to their families following almost 142 years.

“I commend the families of both men and the members of the Castleisland District Heritage Group for their efforts to bring their case to public attention and their help in bringing the process of obtaining a pardon to fruition.”

The case

In the 1880s, there was frequent agitation in Ireland for land reform, which often developed into agrarian violence, over landlords, evictions, rent strikes and boycotts. 

In May 1882, Lord Frederick Cavendish, the chief secretary, and his under secretary TH Burke were murdered in Dublin’s Phoenix Park. 

Their killings were the catalyst for the legislative response to the growing agrarian unrest. 

The Prevention of Crime (Ireland) Act 1882 (1882 Act) was a piece of coercive legislation passed in July 1882 in the aftermath of the Phoenix Park murders to clamp down on crimes such as “treason, murder, arson, attacks on dwelling-houses and crimes of aggravated violence”.

Co Kerry and the area around Castleisland in particular experienced a great deal of unrest and violence during this period.

On 3 October 1882, Thomas Browne was murdered while working in one of his fields in Dromulton, near Scartaglin in Co Kerry.

Two men in dark coats, seen from behind, shot him several times.

Sylvester Poff and James Barrett, who did not match the descriptions of the assailants, were known to be in the vicinity at the time.

The two men were arrested following a statement by a neighbour, that they had seen them enter the field where Browne was shot.

The prosecution case largely rested on the evidence of a neighbour, whose story changed as the case progressed and who could not be regarded as a reliable witness.

Poff and Barrett were tried twice before special juries in Cork for the murder of Browne after the jury in the first trial failed to reach agreement on a verdict.

The two men were convicted of the murder of Browne in December 1882 and, despite petitions for mercy to the Lord Lieutenant, they were hanged in Tralee Gaol in January 1883.

Expert review

Dr Niamh Howlin, an expert in 19th Century trial law and an associate professor in the Sutherland School of Law, UCD, was asked by the Department of Justice to undertake an independent external review of this case.

Her examination concluded that a number of factors, including in the investigation and procedures around the trial, led her to form the opinion that Poff’s and Barrett’s convictions were unsafe.

These factors included a “packed jury”, evidential deficiencies including conflicting witness testimony, no motive and that other lines of enquiry appear to have been neglected during the investigation and trial.

In addition, the report found that there was no direct evidence against Poff and Barrett, with the case resting on the circumstantial and contradictory evidence of one witness.

“A 21st century criminal court would not convict Poff and Barrett on the basis of the evidence which was presented by the Crown in 1882. The convictions were also inconsistent with the legal standards of the period,” Dr Howlin said. 

“They were convicted on the basis of evidence which was both circumstantial and weak,” she said. 

“The trials and conviction of Poff and Barrett included legal and procedural deficiencies which were ‘so inconsistent with the legal standards of the period and so objectively unsatisfactory and unfair, that they render the conviction unsafe.”

Additional reporting by Lauren Boland