Desmond and the tribunal

The tenor of Dermot Desmond's defiant statement on 20 December, in response to the Moriarty tribunal report, was that he had been vindicated by the tribunal. This is less than the full import of the Tribunal's conclusions concerning Dermot Desmond. The following are some of the conclusions of the Tribunal.

That in spite of a claim of willingness to co-operate fully with the tribunal, he was less than cooperative Mr Dermot Desmond made two payments to Mr Haughey after Mr Haughey had retired from public life: one for Stg£100,000.00 in 1994, and one for Stg£25,000.00 in 1996. Mr Desmond issued a public statement in January 1998 in which he had stated that: “If payments made by Mr Desmond to Mr CJ Haughey since 1994 are matters that fall within the Terms of Reference of the Moriarty Tribunal, Mr Desmond had already stated that he will fully co-operate with this Tribunal.”
Shortly after the publication of that statement, the Tribunal requested information from Mr Desmond about payments made by him to Mr Haughey after Mr  Haughey had ceased to hold public office. In the event, Mr Desmond declined to provide the Tribunal with any information until 22 March 1999, by which time the Tribunal had already identified the two payments in question, from statements of the S8 sterling MemorandumAccount which were available to the Tribunal, and from information provided by Mr Pádraig Collery and by Mr Jack Stakelum. (23.69).

Desmond claimed these payments were made by way of loans. The Tribunal rejected those claims
The Tribunal cannot accept Mr Desmond's evidence that these payments were otherwise than outright dispositions made by him to Mr Haughey, notwithstanding Mr Desmond's characterisations of them as loans. It is clear to the Tribunal that neither Mr Desmond, nor Mr Haughey, had any intention or any belief that the funds would ever be repaid to Mr Desmond. (23.70)

Contrary to Desmond's claims, the tribunal asserted the motive for making such payments were connected with the public office Haughey formerly held. In so concluding, the Tribunal has had regard to the following matters:– (i) The payments were not isolated payments. (ii) They were not made in a transparent manner, but on the contrary, they were shrouded in secrecy, and were made from one off-shore account, through a series of off-shore accounts to what was, at least nominally, an off-shore account, held for the benefit of Mr.Haughey. (iii) They followed in the path of an established pattern of support by Mr Desmond of the business ventures of Mr Haughey's family and they further followed the conferring of an indirect benefit of £75,456.00 on Mr Haughey by Mr Desmond, through the financing of the refit of the Haughey family yacht, Celtic Mist, all of which occurred during Mr Haughey's tenure as Taoiseach. (iv) Mr Desmond was asked by Mr Traynor to provide funding for Mr Haughey while Mr Haughey was Taoiseach, which Mr Desmond declined, not as a consequence of any principled objection but due to his then financial frailty. (v) While Mr Desmond testified that these payments were prompted by no more than friendship for Mr Haughey, it is clear that such friendship arose in the context of Mr Haughey's office as Taoiseach.

The Tribunal was unable to make a finding that these were the only payments made by Desmond to Haughey
Mr Desmond testified to the Tribunal that apart from these payments amounting to Stg. £125,000.00, apart from the investments that he made in companies with which Mr Haughey was associated and, apart from the funding of £75,456.00 in respect of the cost of refitting the Haughey family yacht, Celtic Mist, he made no other payments to Mr Haughey, or to persons associated with him, within the meaning of the Tribunal's Terms of Reference. In particular, Mr Desmond testified that he made no direct payments to Mr Haughey prior to 1994, after Mr Haughey had left office. Whilst it must be said that the Tribunal has heard no evidence to the contrary, the Tribunal cannot make a finding to that effect as neither Mr Haughey's off-shore accounts nor Mr Desmond's off-shore accounts were accessible to the Tribunal for the purposes of verifying this matter.

Desmond's Celtic Mists payments were an indirect benefit to Haughey, made while Haughey was Taoiseach
The total of these payments amounted to £75,546.00. Despite evidence from Mr Desmond and Mr Conor Haughey to the effect that these payments were advanced as loans, the Tribunal has no hesitation in all the circumstances in finding that they were outright dispositions, and that the entire of the said sum of £75,546.00 constituted an indirect payment by Mr Desmond to Mr.Charles Haughey.