The Enoch Burke Saga: A Teacher’s Defiance and Ireland’s Judicial Reckoning
DUBLIN – Enoch Burke, the unyielding history teacher from Wilson’s Hospital School in County Westmeath, finds himself back behind bars at Mountjoy Prison, marking his fourth committal in three years. Arrested on November 25, 2025, near the very school gates he has haunted like a ghost since his 2022 dismissal, Burke’s latest breach of a High Court injunction has drawn fresh scorn from the bench. Mr. Justice Alexander Cregan, in a November 18 ruling, branded Burke’s persistence a “fanatical campaign” and a “deliberate, sustained and concerted attack” on the civil courts and the rule of law.
Enoch Burke: Irish School Teacher Jailed Following His Stance Against Transgender Ideology https://t.co/CNem5nX7VV
— The Gateway Pundit (@gatewaypundit) December 5, 2025
“Mr. Burke has refused to obey a court order not to trespass at the school for three years,” the judge declared, underscoring that the case turns not on Burke’s evangelical objections to transgender ideology, but on raw contempt.
The saga began in the summer of 2022, when Burke, then 50, clashed with school principal Niamh McClafferty over her directive to address a 16-year-old pupil – who had transitioned and requested “they/them” pronouns – accordingly. Citing his devout Christian faith, Burke refused, storming a school board meeting and disrupting a religious service. Suspended and later fired for gross misconduct, he vowed to return. Despite an interim injunction barring him from the premises, Burke pitched a tent on school grounds that August, protesting what he called an assault on his religious liberty. Gardaí hauled him away on September 5, landing him in Mountjoy for 108 days – his first taste of iron bars for defying the law.
The pattern repeated with grim predictability. Released in December 2022 amid escalating fines – now totaling €225,000, with only €40,000 paid from his diverted salary – Burke resurfaced at the school gates each term. September 2023 brought a second jailing, 122 days this time, after he again ignored the order. Fines climbed to €1,400 daily, then €2,000. By August 2024, as pupils filed in for the new year, Burke was arrested once more, his family filming the handcuffing for viral outrage. A third stint followed, 196 days, with Justice Peter Nolan in September urging the school to hire security – a grim admission that judicial writ alone couldn’t deter him.
Into 2025, the Burkes escalated. Siblings Ammi, Caleb, and others joined protests, confronting Education Authority chair Mervyn Storey at a County Antrim church in August over gender policies. Enoch returned repeatedly: affidavits from principal Noel Cunningham detail disrupted inductions for first-years, with Burke looming in communal areas. In September, Justice Nolan reiterated the trespass ban. Yet on November 11, 2025, Burke slipped back in, triggering the latest warrant. Gardaí, after a brief manhunt, nabbed him in Mullingar. On December 3, Justice Cregan denied Christmas release, insisting Burke “purge his contempt” by pledging to stay away – no holidays, no mercy until compliance.
Burke’s family, headed by barrister father Seamus – a one-time Fine Gael candidate – frames this as martyrdom. “They are persecuting my son for his beliefs,” Mrs. Martina Burke lamented post-arrest, her voice cracking in online videos. Enoch himself, from the dock, decries a “disgrace on our country,” insisting his returns are to his “place of work.” Supporters on the fringes hail him a free-speech warrior; critics see a bully terrorizing staff and students.
Over 500 days imprisoned, Burke’s odyssey exposes fractures in Ireland’s secular shift. What began as a pronouns row has morphed into a standoff testing the courts’ monopoly on obedience. Justice Cregan was blunt: “Instead of educating the young people of tomorrow, they are having to deal with Mr. Burke and his antics.” The pupils, caught in the crossfire, suffer most – induction days rerouted, teachers on edge, a school board bankrupted by legal fees exceeding €2 million.
Yet herein lies the dreadful optics for Ireland and its vaunted rule of law. A nation that prides itself on Enlightenment values – dialogue over dogma – now jails a man repeatedly for civil trespass, fines him into penury, and deploys police to schoolyards like some dystopian patrol. Burke may be contumacious, his tactics disruptive, but the spectacle of state power grinding down one dissenter on a matter of conscience reeks of overreach. When courts equate pronoun defiance with an “attack on authority,” and families become collateral in a judicial vendetta, trust erodes.
Ireland, post-Treaty and post-Troubles, should foster debate, not dungeons. This Burke affair doesn’t just tarnish the Emerald Isle’s image; it mocks the very legal edifice meant to protect the vulnerable – on both sides of the classroom door.
Legal
The legal basis for Enoch Burke’s repeated arrests and imprisonments is contempt of court for breaching a High Court injunction that bars him from attending Wilson’s Hospital School, which constitutes obstruction and trespass rather than a direct punishment for his views on gender ideology or refusal to use pronouns.
Irish judges have explicitly stated in rulings that Burke is entitled to his religious beliefs and opinions on transgender issues, but the penalties stem from his deliberate and ongoing defiance of court orders to stay away from the premises after his dismissal.
The original conflict arose in 2022 from his refusal to address a transgender student by their preferred pronouns, leading to his suspension and firing for gross misconduct, but the subsequent court actions and jail terms are framed strictly as enforcement of the injunction and not as a judgment on his ideology.
Fact-checks and reports consistently debunk claims that he is being punished solely for his beliefs, emphasizing instead his “fanatical campaign” of non-compliance with judicial authority.
However, Burke and his supporters argue that the case indirectly represents persecution over conscience rights tied to gender ideology, viewing the legal system as enforcing such policies.
