John L. Murray
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John L. Murray was appointed as the Chief Justice of the Irish Supreme Court in July 2004, replacing Ronan Keane.
John Murray was born in Limerick in 1943. He was taught at Cresent College, in Limerick and then at University College Dublin (UCD) and at the King's Inns. He qualified as a barrister in 1967 and had a successful law practice dealing with commercial, civil, and constitutional law.
He has served on the Supreme Court since 1999 and was a member of the European Court of Justice since 1992. He served as an Attorney General in the 1982 Fianna Fáil government. The Taoiseach Charles Haughey appointed him when his predecessor, Patrick Connolly, resigned as a result of the fact that a man who was convicted of murder was arrested in the Attorney's General flat.
His next term in office as Attorney General was in 1987. In 1988 he refused to allow the extradition of Fr. Patrick Ryan to Britain on explosives charges dealing with the Provisional IRA on the basis that the trial he would be given would not be fair to due excessive media coverage.
He is married to Gabrielle Walsh, daughter of former Supreme Court judge Brian Walsh, and they have two children, Brian and Catriona.