Inside Enoch Burke's latest battle of words with judge
The Oxford English Dictionary (OED) featured in Enoch Burke’s latest hearing, after he challenged the judge’s description of him as ‘baleful’ and ‘malign’.
Mr Burke complained he had been wrongly described by Judge Brian Cregan, who last month said there was ‘something deeply unsettling’ about his presence at the school.
‘He doesn’t just trespass onto the school grounds; he goes right into the heart of the school, roaming around its corridors when he has no right to do so,’ he wrote in a judgment.
Enoch Burke leaving the High Court with his father Seán, right. Pic: Brian Lawless/PA Wire
‘He is a baleful and malign presence, an intruder stalking the school, its teachers and its pupils,’ he added.
On Wednesday, Mr Burke produced what he claimed to be a dictionary definition of baleful, which he said meant ‘threatening harm, or menacing’, and denied this applied to him.
The judge responded: ‘That’s not right – you seem to have got that from a Google search. The Oxford English Dictionary has an entirely different definition.’
Enoch Burke. Pic: Brian Lawless/PA Wire
He read from the OED, saying definitions of the word included malign, noxious, injurious and mischievous.
‘It does not say threatening harm. One needs to be more intellectually rigorous, Mr Burke, if you are asking me to set aside certain adjectives I used.
‘Barristers who spend their whole lives arguing about words always refer to the [OED]. That is the authoritative source.’
He said he would reserve his decision on the application for an amendment to his judgment, adding: ‘You have assassinated your own character. All I did was describe it and call it out.’
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