Amid the recent controversy over whether Jean McConville was or was not an "informer", the central issue is obscured. A woman was murdered without trial or due process or justification by people who had no authority to administer justice of any kind. This was, and remains, a shocking crime and everyone associated with that crime – those who perpetrated it, those who ordered it, those who knew of it and remained silent, those who gave even a semblance of justification for it – are guilty of an enormous wrong.

Mary Wilson, RTÉ's legal affairs correspondent, recalls her 10 years at the Four Courts and looks forward to presenting a new drive-time radio programme. In interview with Vincent Browne

The judges of the Supreme Court have failed to explain how they justified their order to imprison a man on the basis of a law the court had declared was 'null and void'. By Vincent Browne

Amid the pieties and solemnities surrounding the "commemoration" of the Battle of the Somme, there was not a single hint of outrage, the only appropriate response to what happened then and in the course of the First World War generally. Between 10 and 12 million people lost their lives in that war and another 20 million people were injured. It was the most barbaric war the world had known up to that time, and what was it about? Nothing. Nothing aside from the imperial ambitions of Germany, Russia and Britain.

The 2005 report of the Mental Health Commission reveals shocking conditions and shocking neglect. By Vincent Browne

The super-trawler Atlantic Dawn was allowed to fish off the west African coast, while other EU vessels were curtailed. By Max McGuinness

Joe Higgins caught the mood of despondency within the government in his remarks in the Dáil on Tuesday 27 June. He referred to headlines in that morning's newspapers about the negligible tax being paid by the wealthiest in society, and the revelation that we have one of the worst health services in Europe. He said: "The government has wasted the fruits of the boom. This is the key issue. It slashes taxes on the super-rich, but social and educational infrastructure in areas of booming population increases is stunningly absent.

John Gilligan challenges the Special Criminal Court's findings on his motivation for the murder of Veronica Guerin. By Vincent Browne

There was a significant development in the Brian Rossiter case on Tuesday 27 June when the person who assaulted him five days before he died pleaded guilty to a charge of assault.

The print media turned venomously on Charles Haughey after his death. The tabloids salivated over gossip about his private life. But even the more sober evaluations were almost unanimously vituperative, most especially the Irish Times. In a defining news feature, published on Saturday 17 June, Peter Murtagh claimed the 1982 Haughey government represented the most serious threat to democracy since the civil war.
Vincent Browne analyses the claims