Garda: It's not bad apples, it's the barrel
How Garda headquarters ignored alarming reports of terrorist plans; how Gardai mishandled a "murder" investigation; how Gardai tried to "frame" innocent people; how a Garda was implicated in extortion. By Vincent Browne
In July 1996, William Doherty, a small-time petty criminal in Donegal, offered to become a Provisional IRA informer. Allegedly, he made this offer in return for an agreement by the gardaí not to prosecute him for driving a vehicle without tax or insurance. Four months later, in November 1996, a stream of "intelligence" reports started to come through to Garda Headquarters, to its Crime and Security division (formerly known as the "intelligence" division). Between 8 November 1996 and 17 July 1997 a total of 43 such reports came through to headquarters, along with one hand-written report.
The information contained in these reports was dramatic and alarming. The Morris Tribunal was constrained from divulging the contents of these but states that the information, if true would "mean that there were serious and detailed terror operations being planned by the 'Provisional IRA' in the immediate area (of Donegal)" (paragraph 1.63) and that "the information included at least a number of immediate threats to the life of people in the locality". Later on, the report states: "on its face, it was information of the highest quality" (paragraph 8.39).
The report continues: "If thought to be reliable it demanded that immediate steps be taken at operational level. This was never done. None of the intended victims were ever notified. Nobody was ever arrested. Nothing was ever found" (paragraph 8.39). Mr Justice Morris notes: "no action was taken in relation to this astonishing information. It is, in my view, unthinkable that such information would pass without a reaction of a very significant nature"(paragraph 1.63).
And it was not just the delinquent gardaí then based in Donegal that were at fault, although the Chief Superintendent involved locally, Denis Fitzpatrick, is severely criticised by the report for failing to act on the information. The report makes the following observation:
"The Tribunal finds that Crime & Security Branch, despite not having an operational role, ought to have done far more to find out whether any of the dramatic information submitted had produced any positive results. Crime & Security Branch, even under the system prevailing at the time, was negligent in failing to make the necessary inquiries.
"The Tribunal has heard evidence that Senior Officers in Crime & Security had doubts about the veracity of the material which was being submitted. The Tribunal is of the view that once these doubts arose then there was a duty cast upon the officers concerned to make such inquiries as they considered appropriate to address this situation.
The Tribunal has no doubt that had they done so, then many of the facts which are contained in this report would have come to light. That failure enabled the perpetrators to carry on their fraudulent activities. It is perhaps ironic that those manipulating the situation, being Superintendent Lennon (who has been dismissed from the force, following the first Morris Tribunal report) and Garda O'Dowd (a central character in the second report and intimately involved in the attempted "framing" of Frank McBrearty jnr and March McConnell for the murder of Richie Barron) , could rely on the negligence of those in charge of the Donegal Division and the failure of the personnel in Crime & Security Branch to appropriately react to their doubts, to be able to achieve their desired goal of submitting bogus information to enhance their careers" (paragraph 8.66.14/15).
The report continues: "The Tribunal is satisfied that Superintendent Lennon and Garda O'Dowd used William Doherty as a means whereby they could send up bogus information on subversive matters to Crime & Security Branch in Garda Headquarters. They did this as a means of enhancing their careers within An Garda Síochána. They were confident that their scheme would not be discovered, due to the fact that they controlled the intelligence at the operational level in Donegal and because they knew that Crime & Security Branch would not enquire too deeply into the information submitted to them. It was the emergence of totally unconnected issues, which ultimately led to the uncovering of their cunning plan" (paragraph 8.67).
"Crime and Security", the "intelligence" division at Garda Headquarters, had many reasons to be suspicious.
An unusual feature of these "intelligence reports emanating from Donegal (recorded in a form known as C77) was that they tended to come in batches, sometimes two or three together, on one occasion nine together. The Garda "handling" the supposed informer, Garda John O Dowd, told the Morris Tribunal that the reason for dispatching these C77 forms in batches was because of long queues at the local post office, the cost of registered post and because he wanted to send these forms along with forms related to other informers, so as to protect the identify of William Doherty. (The Morris Tribunal did not believe this explanation.) Crime and Security raised no questions about the peculiarity of sending the intelligence reports in this unusual way.
The officers in Crime and Security also had regular discussions with Chief Superintendent Denis Fitzpatrick and never, apparently, raised any of the obvious questions about what follow through there had been on the alarming reports of imminent IRA atrocities.
That perhaps is the most significant revelation of the report but the other revelations concerning the conduct of gardaí in Donegal are astonishing.
(Richard Barron was found dead on the roadway outside Raphoe, County Donegal, in the early hours of Monday the 14th of October 1996. A phone call was made by people who found his body to the local gardaí. What follows are edited extracts from the Tribunal's report )
Garda Pádraig Mulligan, who was the Garda supposed to be on duty in Raphoe at the time of Mr. Barron's death, could not be found and he did not answer his call from Central Communications. In fact, the evidence before the Tribunal was to the effect that he was drinking in a public house in Lifford with Garda John O'Dowd, his off-duty colleague, at the time. When the Communications Centre at Letterkenny was alerted by a call from a householder requesting Garda assistance, this communication was relayed to Lifford Garda Station. …The crew of the Lifford Garda car, which was delegated to answer the call in the absence of Garda Pádraig Mulligan, deliberately delayed answering the call until after they would have had their meal break. Were it not for a second call from the householder repeating the request for Garda assistance made to the Communications Centre that was relayed to Lifford, they would not have answered the call at that time. I am satisfied that the account of this incident which was given to the Tribunal by the Gardaí involved is not correct. … If any confirmation was needed as to the lack of enthusiasm that they had for answering the call, then it is provided by the scandalous way in which they behaved once they did answer the call.
The Tribunal is satisfied that there were a number of appalling deficiencies in the manner in which the scene of this crime was handled, in the initial stages of the investigation conducted by Gardaí Mulligan, O'Dowd, Birney and McDwyer. The scene was not cordoned off and preserved at the earliest opportunity.
Potential evidence located at the scene was not preserved. The body of the deceased, inclusive of all belongings and clothing, was not identified at an early stage and preserved until the post mortem. Details of the nature and type of incident were not properly communicated, in accordance with the procedures laid down, for the information of adjoining stations and supervisory ranks at an early stage. A member in charge of the investigation was not assigned to the case at an early stage. The District Officer was not informed at the earliest opportunity. Statements were not taken at the scene and the motor vehicles at the scene were not examined until returned days later. There was a complete breakdown of proper investigative procedure in relation towhat was being treated initially as a fatal road-traffic accident. Indeed, what is most shocking is that the Gardaí concerned were not ignorant of proper procedure but decided not to follow it.
The failure of duty on the part of those present (at the scene of Richard Barron's death) was shocking and obvious.
That Superintendent Fitzgerald and Chief Superintendent Fitzpatrick were aware of this within the first 24 hour and 48 hours of this investigation is obvious from the fact that Inspector Gallagher was directed to carry out some sort of inquiry into the matter. Superintendent Fitzgerald said that such dereliction could not be regarded as a minor breach of discipline subject to regulation 7 of the Disciplinary Regulations.
It is equally shocking and appalling in the light of the known events that Chief Superintendent Fitzpatrick did nothing about the matter when he received Superintendent Gallagher's report. No member was made amenable to discipline for this neglect of duty. Matters such as this should be addressed and be capable of being addressed immediately without the necessity for protracted inquiries and investigations which lead to inaction and encourage indiscipline, inefficiency and negligence.
Garda Mulligan refused to account for his movements on the night. When called upon to do so, he devised various methods of thwarting the superior officers making these enquiries. He perceived no obligation whatever to answer for his duties and he felt that he was justified on the basis of an entirely mischievous reference to his constitutional right to silence. Garda O'Dowd, his colleague on the occasion, was off duty and therefore should have had no difficulty whatever in accounting for his movements. He adopted the same attitude. The reality is that both of these officers sought to prevent the lawful enquiries made by their senior officers, by instructing their solicitors to write letters threatening defamation proceedings in relation to the witness whom, it was believed at that time, was in a position to establish their whereabouts at the relevant time. There was, in my view, no justification whatever for their shocking disregard of their duties.
(Quite quickly the gardaí formed the suspicion that Frank McBrearty jnr and his cousin Mark McConnell together were responsible for Richard Barron's death.)
With regard to Mr. McBrearty Junior, the statements showed that he spent the night working in his father's public house and disco premises. He was involved in a number of incidents ejecting patrons from the premises. Frank McBrearty Junior had virtually no possibility to absent himself from the premises for long enough to carry out the assault on Mr. Barron. At no stage during the night was he in Mr. McConnell's company...
With regard to Mr. McConnell's position, the numerous statements taken by the Gardaí … all indicated that he spent the night drinking in a bar in Raphoe and later left that bar at approximately 01:30 on the morning of the 14th of October, that is to say approximately thirty minutes after Mr. Barron had been found dead on the road...
The possibility that it was a road-traffic accident was abandoned (by the gardaí), even though there was no forensic pathology report to support the belief that Mr. Barron had died as a result of an assault.
There was a prejudice against Frank McBrearty Junior which led to a rush to judgment on the part of the Garda Síochána that he was guilty of involvement in the death of the late Mr. Richard Barron. There were also elements within An Garda Síochána who set out to frame Frank McBrearty Junior and Mark McConnell.
Notwithstanding the fact that the statements gathered by the Garda Síochána, when examined, create a picture supporting Mr McBrearty Junior's presence at his place of work, and his involvement in the various incidents already described and that this information comes from several disparate sources, it was ignored. The Garda Síochána made an assumption of guilt.
(A central point in this saga is a statement, which later transpired to have been entirely false, made by a man, with what was described as "a susceptible mind", Robert McBride, which gave some credence to the claim that Frank McBrearty jnr and Mark McConnell were implicated in the killing of Richard Barron. Robert McBride was arrested on 29 November 1996, supposedly on suspicion of having stolen an aerial. Even after he had made a statement admitting to the theft of the aerial he was detained n the Garda station and after some hours made a further statement, this time implicating Frank McBrearty jnr and Mark McConnell in the murder of Richard Barron.)
The Tribunal is satisfied that the driving force in this interview (of Robert McBride) was Garda John O'Dowd. Garda Philip Collins was his willing and able accomplice.
Sergeant Martin Moylan ought to have had enough experience and intelligence not to involve himself in this sorry business. However, he was swept along by the other two. It is also to be regretted that he did not give a truthful account of the interview to the Tribunal. Whatever Robert Noel McBride was saying that night, it was doctored by the Gardaí so that it told the story that the other witnesses were not prepared to tell.
Robert Noel McBride tried to persuade the Gardaí that he was not in Raphoe on that night. They would not listen. If they had listened he could easily have told them that he had been at christenings on two successive weekends. Their demeanour towards him was so threatening and oppressive that he could not speak rationally in defence of his own interests. He was overborne and agreed to say what they wanted him to say.
On the face of the statement, Robert Noel McBride recounts the people that he says he saw on that night. These were people who were, in fact, in and around Raphoe that night. The only people who were in a good position to recount that fact were the Gardaí interviewing him. The circumstances of who was in or around Raphoe on that night were definitively known to members of the investigation team. This knowledge was exploited in order to create a fraudulent statement. The contents of the statement came from the Gardaí.
The responsibility for this gross misconduct rests with Garda John O'Dowd and Garda Philip Collins. Sergeant Martin Moylan is also responsible for not controlling this misbehavior and for allowing himself to be dragged into this sorry incident.
The directing minds of the Barron investigation were Superintendent Shelly, Superintendent Fitzgerald, Inspector McGinley and, from February in 1997, Superintendent Lennon. The main bulk of the responsibility for this extraordinary conduct must therefore rest on their shoulders. They did nothing to attempt to sort out the genesis of Mr. McBride's statements or to do any basic check which ordinary police procedure would have required as to the correspondence of his account with that of other people.
The checking of who saw '(Robert McBride in Raphoe on the night in question) should have taken a few days. It took nine months. No-one bothered to follow it up (had they done so they would have discovered he was not in Raphoe on the night and therefore could not have been witness to what he averred in his statement).
It is impossible not to see that negligence of the most astonishing kind, amounting to recklessness of the highest degree, characterised this investigation. Anyone who had anything good to say about the suspects was either treated with skepticism or checked thoroughly. Mr. McBride was treated like a sacred totem. His statement was not checked. No questions were asked about it. Any questions that might have been asked about it were assigned to Garda O'Dowd, a person of dubious character and a very junior member of the investigation team with no detective experience. When he came back having drawn blanks in relation to anyone else having seen Mr. McBride, this was regarded as completely acceptable to the investigation team. This happened because they wanted to believe that. This is shocking.
(Michael and Charlotte Peoples, friends of the McBreartys, received several phone calls from an anonymous person (later identified as the "informer" William Doherty) attempting to extort money from them in return for withholding a false allegation that they too had been implicated in the killing of Richard Barron.)
What is shocking in this investigation is the manner in which the Garda authorities in Donegal failed to pursue the telephone records of Garda John O'Dowd during the period from June 1997, from when they first realised that there was an indication that the final call may have come from his house, to when he eventually voluntarily handed over his records in January 1998.
As to whether the plot to telephone Michael Peoples was directly inspired by Garda O'Dowd, the Tribunal cannot say. The reality is that on the previous evening there was a phone call lasting some fourteen minutes and twelve seconds between Garda O'Dowd and William Doherty. It is highly likely that the plot, as executed on the next evening, was discussed on that occasion. As to whether Garda O'Dowd inspired William Doherty, or the other way around, it is impossible to say. In reality, both were deeply involved in this particularly nasty work of mischief. As to whether Garda O'Dowd was himself inspired by other members of An Garda Síochána, the Tribunal can only suspect. In the absence of proof, it would be unfair to make any finding beyond the observation that it would be unlikely for Garda O'Dowd to embark on this course without advice and guidance. The Tribunal can put the matter no further.
The Tribunal is of the view that the telephone calls to Michael Peoples were made with the full knowledge and co-operation of Garda John O'Dowd. This course of action was pursued for the purpose of setting up Michael Peoples for an arrest in the hope and expectation that he would confess his involvement in the plot to murder Richard Barron, which plot never existed, while in Garda custody.
It cannot be proved that either Garda John O'Dowd or Superintendent Kevin Lennon planned specifically that William Doherty would make an extortion telephone demand to Michael Peoples with a view to entrapping him into revealing evidence as to this supposed involvement in the murder of Richard Barron.
However, Garda John O'Dowd must have been aware that William Doherty was manipulating evidence through various means that meant that he would be unable to control him as to the methodology which he chose to adopt. The telephone calls attempting to extort money from Michael Peoples were approved by Garda John O'Dowd, including the one made from his home on the 9th of November 1996. He supported this conduct as a strategy to entrap Michael Peoples. It was later more widely approved of, within the conspiracy to frame Mr. Peoples, Mr McBrearty Junior and Mr. McConnell, as a legitimate tactic to ensure the creation of evidence against parties believed to be guilty of the crime, in conspiracy with Garda Philip Collins.
When Garda John O'Dowd realised that the telephone call could be traced he, first of all, caused internal Garda documents to be fraudulently altered in conspiracy with Garda Philip Collins. Garda John O'Dowd then consulted with Superintendent Kevin Lennon who advised him on a strategy of stonewalling and lying. This strategy would have led to the investigation going nowhere but for the ability of private investigators to illegally obtain telephone records. The efficiency of the State system of investigating telephone communications had been left by Eircom in an appalling state. When, in June 1997, it became apparent that William Doherty and Garda John O'Dowd were involved in these telephone calls, Superintendent Kevin Lennon advised Garda John O'Dowd on a strategy of refusal to answer questions.
At this time, from June through to the end of 1997, the catastrophic collapse of the evidence of Robert Noel McBride was occupying the time and thought of Detective Inspector John McGinley. Probably for that reason, and definitely for reasons which required that he be disconnected from any responsibility in investigating the matter, Superintendent Kevin Lennon required him to complete the investigation file into the Peoples' phone calls. The idea was to push another burden on top of Detective Inspector McGinley and thus to distance Superintendent Lennon from the matter.
In June 1997, Garda John O'Dowd and Superintendent Lennon revealed to Chief Superintendent Fitzpatrick that an extortion call had been made from the home of a Garda. For reasons probably connected with the good name of the Gardaí in Donegal, Chief Superintendent Fitzpatrick authorised a cover-up.
When, eventually, in January 1998, Garda John O'Dowd produced the billing records for his home phone, it confirmed that a call had been made from his home to the home of Michael Peoples, attempting to extort money. John O'Dowd then knew that he was going to be faced with questioning by his superior officers. Superintendent Kevin Lennon then advised him to deal with the interview by stonewalling every question. The chaotic state of the Garda discipline regulations, and of Garda management, allowed this. This shocking situation continues as of the time of this report.