Another milestone in our sad history of ham-fisted efforts at reforming the law.

(From Irish Independent)

THE release from prison of Mr 'A', the self-confessed rapist of a 12-year-old girl, is the first major negative off-shoot of last week's Supreme Court judgment which declared part of the 1935 Criminal Law (Amendment) Act unconstitutional.

It is very difficult for non-lawyers to understand how such a set of circumstances could occur. This was not, after all, a case where there was an argument over an alleged 'honest mistake'.

Mr 'A' was merely taking advantage of the fact that the 1935 Act is now, essentially, dead in the water. The "appalling vista" that Senior Counsel Gerard Hogan referred to in the case, seems to have come …