Sophie Toscan du Plantier: No New Court Case?

A district judge threw out an application for summons by solicitor Robert Sheehan against Senan Molony and others on Monday 14 July.

I fear justice has been delayed a little longer. On Monday 14 July, district judge Anne Watkin refused to issue the summonses against Senan Molony and others requested by Robert Sheehan.

There appears to have been some back and forth between the two of them but first let’s make sure you are on top of the latest. Robert Sheehan is a solicitor who worked in the office of the DPP at the time Sophie Toscan du Plantier was killed by persons unknown in December 1996.

One of his tasks was to make a report based on the police file as to whether charges should be brought against an English suspect, Ian Bailey. In a 44-page calm and neutral document, he tore apart the weak and circumstantial evidence. This report would not ordinarily have been published but a long and (still ongoing!) legal process caused it to be revealed in 2011 and at some point thereafter, Robert Sheehan was identified as the author.

However it is important to note that the report is officially part of the DPP role and was signed off by many other senior colleagues including the DPP at the time. It is most certainly not the result of a “jury of one” or other similar nonsense claims. It is one of the most balanced official documents ever written about this case.

The only people who have an issue with this report are those who have decided (ironically enough, sitting as juries of one) that Ian Bailey killed a French tourist whom he had never met, did not know, and who lived a long and treacherous walk away.

Bailey wandered for several miles over the hillside just before Christmas 1996, viciously attacked a stranger in such a way that hardened professionals still cannot talk about it without crying, and left her to die in the lane beside her cottage. He went miles out of his way to “wash” his clothes by Kealfadda Bridge, which would have been futile in the dark, and then calmly wandered home for breakfast with his partner, her daughters, and several house guests as though nothing had happened. Furthermore, he left the house and returned to it totally undetected by any of its occupants.

This is one possible version of what happened that night. I suggest it is ludicrous.

The judge threw out the application for two reasons: the first initial reason given was that the comments made by Senan Molony were of a general nature against the public office of the DPP. Nobody who has followed this case will agree with that, but then debate moved forwards.

The final reason given for not allowing the application is that the DPP office itself had written an email dated 3 July 2025 stating that “the facts contained in a draft information prepared by [Sheehan] did not disclose a criminal offence or offences which may be put to a jury for its consideration.”

That email was obviously about an early draft and not relating to the final application document, but anyway this should not have mattered because in the same email: “the DPP refers to the Supreme Court decision in Kelly v. Ryan [2015] 1 IR 360 which points out that the question of whether or not to issue a summons is at all times one in the discretion of the District Judge.”

It is hard not to conclude that the district judge in this case was looking for excuses not to let the case proceed. There are so many vested interests in this case that it is a risk even writing about it. But this is not the end of the story. Robert Sheehan fights on, and will seek clarification of these points of law from the DPP again.

That cottage. That Fiesta.