The entry of a convicted rapist into Ireland without a visa has prompted the Tánaiste to say the State must look again at visa-free travel policies.
Speaking to Gript outside Government Buildings ahead of this week’s Cabinet meeting, Foreign Affairs Minister Simon Harris described Randi Gladstone as a “heinous criminal who has carried out the most horrific crimes.”
“This is a bad individual that committed a horrific crime,” he said. “And he’s rightly serving a very significant sentence in relation to that.”
Gladstone, a Guyanese national with 19 previous convictions in the UK including for rape and kidnapping, raped and falsely imprisoned an 18-year-old woman at a holiday complex in Dublin within days of arriving in Ireland last August. He was sentenced to ten years in prison earlier this year.
Harris previously said on April 1st that he was not across the details of the case, and again on April 29th that he did not have the information.
However, this week, asked by Gript’s Ben Scallan how the case occurred, and what went wrong, Harris said his understanding was that Gladstone did not come through the international protection system.
“He didn’t come in seeking international protection,” Harris said. “I also understand that, because he was of the nationality that he was, a visa may not have been – and was not – required for his entry into the country.”
The Tánaiste said that individuals who do claim asylum go through a series of fingerprinting and database checks, and can be refused entry if they have committed certain offences.
Notably, previous reporting by Gript indicates that the Tánaiste is mistaken in his suggestion that fingerprinting of asylum applicants involves criminal record checks. According to information obtained from the Department of Justice, fingerprints are checked against the Eurodac database, which confirms if someone has claimed asylum in another EU country, but does not contain any criminal history data.
“The issue here seems to be that this man was not known to our immigration services,” the Tánaiste continued.
“He didn’t seek to come in through international protection, and was travelling from a country in which a visa wasn’t required.
“Of course it raises issues in relation to how we always need to look at all of our processes. We always have to look at where we have visa restrictions from and where we don’t.”
Asked if Ireland should be liaising more with other countries such as the UK to find out if individuals are dangerous before they enter the country, Harris replied: “Yes, we should.”
“No, there’s no doubt – I mean, your point is valid,” he said.
“I mean, nobody wants to see heinous criminals from other jurisdictions come into our country. Of course we don’t. What country in the world wants that?”
He added that the State must examine visa-free travel protocols.
“I do think it raises legitimate questions about how we tighten up further our checks in relation to countries where there is visa-free travel, and I will be raising this matter with the Minister for Justice,” he said.
Notably, Ireland has visa-free travel arrangements with 49 countries, including Guyana, Brazil, Guatemala, El Salvador, Brunei, and more.
As reported by Gript in January 2024, the Department of Justice has confirmed that asylum applicants’ fingerprints are not checked against any criminal record databases. The Eurodac and Schengen systems used during processing do not contain criminal history data.
In a response to TD Carol Nolan, the Department wrote that Eurodac only stores fingerprints from immigration interactions, and is not a criminal record system.
“EURODAC is not a criminal records database,” the Department said.
Furthermore, it was revealed that there has never been a single recorded instance of Irish authorities using Eurodac to check fingerprints in the context of serious criminal investigations between 2015 and May 2023.