She is appealing against her conviction for being a member of the so-called Islamic State (IS) terror group.
Her barrister Michael O’Higgins told the Court of Appeal that the only act of association to the unlawful organisation was cooking and cleaning for her former husband.
Smith, 43, from Dundalk in Co Louth, is outlining her case at the Court of Appeal.
The former member of the Defence Forces was found guilty of IS membership in 2023, but was cleared of financing terrorism, after a nine-week trial at Dublin’s Special Criminal Court.
Lisa Smith with her legal representative, Peter Corrigan of Phoenix Law, at the Courts of Criminal Justice, Dublin (Liam McBurney/PA)
Smith, a convert to Islam, went to Syria in 2015 after terrorist leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi called on Muslims to travel there.
She had pleaded not guilty to charges of membership of IS and providing funds to benefit the group.
Smith was sentenced to 15 months in prison and lost an appeal against the severity of the sentence.
The appeal court also heard that Smith led a “totally anonymous” life in Syria and there was no “smoking gun” that she did anything for IS.
Outlining the appeal, Mr O’Higgins said the prosecution claimed Smith was a part of the terror group because she is a western woman who answered the call of terrorist leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi to travel to the Islamic State.
He told the court that it was not a sound legal principle to convict a person of being a member of an illegal organisation.
He said Smith travelled to Syria out of a religious obligation, but the court had dismissed that as “irrelevant”.
Mr O’Higgins said the court cannot ignore and deem inadmissible what th...
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