Court Jails Irish Teacher for Trespassing at Former School, Not for Transgender Views

Irish teacher Enoch Burke has been jailed for repeatedly defying a court order prohibiting him from trespassing at his former place of employment, contrary to widespread claims on social media that he was imprisoned for refusing to use transgender pronouns.

The case has garnered significant attention online, with multiple viral posts mischaracterizing the legal basis for Burke’s incarceration. One Facebook post claimed Burke “has now spent 560 days in prison for refusing to use ‘they’ pronoun for a male student,” while a similar post on X received more than 30 million views. Burke himself posted a video claiming Irish police arrested him on January 19 “for refusing to affirm transgender ideology.”

Court documents reviewed by Reuters tell a different story. According to a January 20 judgment, Burke was jailed for contempt of court after violating an injunction that barred him from Wilson’s Hospital School in central Ireland.

“I want to re-iterate that Mr. Burke has been imprisoned for contempt of court – not for his religious beliefs,” Justice Cregan stated in the judgment. “As I have always said, Mr. Burke is free to proclaim his objections to transgenderism from the rooftops.”

The legal dispute began in August 2022 when the school suspended Burke following his objection to a transgender student’s preferred name and pronouns. Burke also reportedly interrupted a school event to express his views on the matter. The school subsequently dismissed him and obtained a court injunction to prevent him from entering school property.

Despite the court order, Burke continued to appear at the school, leading to his first imprisonment for contempt in September 2022. Since then, he has been in and out of jail multiple times for violating the same court order.

In his most recent case, Burke was briefly released on January 14 to prepare for a disciplinary appeals hearing regarding his dismissal. However, he returned to the school premises on January 15 and 16, directly violating the standing injunction. As a result, on January 19, he was sent to prison for the fifth time.

The Irish education system, like many across Europe, has been navigating the complex terrain of transgender rights and religious freedoms in recent years. Burke’s case has become a flashpoint in this broader cultural conversation, with supporters viewing him as standing up for traditional religious values and critics seeing his actions as defiance of the rule of law.

The Irish Courts Service confirmed the legal basis for Burke’s imprisonment, emphasizing that the contempt charge stemmed from his refusal to obey a lawful court order, not from his personal beliefs about gender identity.

Burke has maintained that the courts have “utterly failed” to uphold his constitutional rights. His case highlights the tension between religious freedom, educational policies, and judicial authority in contemporary Ireland.

The controversy surrounding Burke’s case demonstrates how easily misinformation can spread on social media platforms, particularly when complex legal matters intersect with contentious social issues. While Burke’s original suspension was related to his stance on transgender pronouns, his imprisonment specifically results from his repeated defiance of court orders forbidding him from trespassing at his former workplace.

The Irish police service declined to comment on the matter when contacted by Reuters.