The framing of Marie McCarthy

In March 1983 a 'Today Tonight' programme on the connection between an Irish woman and a plot to kill the Pope was watched by the largest audience 'Today Tonight' has ever had. The following two Sundays the Sunday Press ran major articles on Marie McCarthy (photo inset) and claimed she had information which proved that the CIA was involved in the plot to kill the Pope. By Colm Toibin

Magill has established that she had no such information and that there was no connection whatsoever between Marie McCarthy and the plot to kill the Pope. In this article we trace her background and outline how she came to spend the night of March 22 1983 in Gordon Thomas's house in Ashford, Co Wicklow.

And what happened afterwards: How within a week she was forced to use a different name and identity; how 'Today Tonight' and the Sunday Press damaged an innocent woman.

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1. Gordon Thomas Receives A Phone Call

Early in 1983 when the dust had settled on Irish politics and the country seemed destined for four years of stable government RTE's Today Tonight team decided it was time to consider introducing less serious items into some of their programmes. A few short pieces not necessarily tied to currrent affairs might be a good thing, it was suggested. Someeone came up with the idea of doing an item on Gordon Thomas and his new book "Pontiff". Thomas would always be willing to cooperate with RTE; the station had done an item on Thomas's previous book and it had gone down well. It was decided that "Pontiff" would be a good ten-minute item on a dull night.

Paul Loughlin, a producer on Today Tonight, and Eleanor Donovan, a production assistant, approached Gordon Thomas and he agreed to meet them.

In the 1969 Budget, Charles Haughey, then Minister for Finance, had introduced a tax free status for writers and artists, including writers and artists from abroad who would decide to come to live in Ireland. Over the previous fifteen years many had taken advantage of the scheme, including Frederick Forsyth, author of "The Day Of The Jackal". But perhaps the one who got most publicity was Gordon Thomas. With his partner Max Morgan Witts, he had written a large number of books on subjects of popular interest, such as the Wall Street Crash and the bombing of Guernica. Thomas settled well in Ireland and seemed to enjoy the country. He wrote regularly for newspapers here and was a regular contributor to RTE radio and television programmes. His house was in Ashford in Co Wicklow in an area where a number of other tax-free foreign writers also lived.

Thomas was generous to several Irish publishers, allowing them to publish his work without the usual fees and advannces that an author such as he would have commanded elseewhere. It was in the columns of the Sunday Press that Gordon Thomas's work appeared most often. In 1982 he wrote a series of articles in which he explained that the rumours about President Hillery's infidelity to his wife were put about in Ireland by the KGB in order to underrmine the effect of the Pope's visit.

It was Thursday March 17, St Patrick's Day, when the two members of the Today Tonight team went to see Thomas. Later they would think it was an extraordinary coincidence that they were in his house when the first telephone call came and the first connection made.

The man who rang would not give his name but he needed Thomas's help in something. If Thomas could help him he would give his name. For the moment he would just call himself Bill. Thomas listened, he was interested, yes he thought he could help. Paul Loughlin and Eleanor Donovan from Today Tonight were in the room and they heard Gordon Thomas arranging that the caller would ring back the following Saturday morning. He would probably know by then what the problem was and if he could do anything to help.

Over the next few days Loughlin and Donovan would cease to be interested in doing a short item for Today Tonight on Gordon Thomas's writing of "Pontiff'. They would become interested in the story of the man who made the telephone call. Every programme has to have a name: this one would be identified by those working on it as "Sidelines". Even still in Today Tonight it is recognised as a "sexy story". It had a woman, a few men, some guns, the CIA, secret documents, a car crash, the Special Branch, an assassin, Beirut, a Spanish jail. But above all, more than all these ingredients, it had the Pope.

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2. The Middle East

Beirut 1980. Everybody believed that everybody else was up to something. No one seemed to be who they said they were. So that when Marie McCarthy, who ran a restaurant in the cellar of the Wilner House Hotel, used to joke with Garry Korkola, who came there to eat most nights, that his career as "a dealer in electronics" didn't sound very plaussible to her, that surely he was a CIA man, he used to shrug his shoulders and laugh.

Korkola was wanted in the United States for running guns into Central America. He had skipped bail before he was sentenced to 53 years in prison. He was also a legitiimate arms dealer and has done business with most governnments in the West, including the Irish government and the British government.

Marie McCarthy had come to Lebanon by a circuitous route. She had left her native Cappoquin at the age of seventeen and travelled for a number of years, finding jobs all over the place: in Dublin, Jersey, London, France, Spain, South Africa, New York. In New York she worked for the United Nations, later transferring to South Lebanon where she dealt with complaints from the native population against UN forces. Her work involved regular visits to Beirut and it was there she met a Dutchman called Gerrit, an engineer who was attached to the UNIFIL forces in Lebanon. They became involved and Marie McCarthy decided to leave the UN and move to Beirut.

She found bits and pieces to do. First, through a brother in Dublin she found some work as an advertising agent. Then she organised travel for groups of soldiers serving in the Lebanon by shopping around for the cheapest prices. But it wasn't enough. A friend ran the Wilner House Hotel in Beirut and he took her down one day to look at the dining room in the basement: she agreed to take it over.

It was the sort of thing she was good at: meeting people, going from table to table to make sure everything was all right, keeping the thing going. The opening of the restaurant was a big event with representatives from all shades of opinion in Beirut attending. A friend of Marie McCarthy's arrived to know if he could bring someone else along who hadn't been invited. This man was Garry Korkola who had just arrived in Beirut.

So every night Korkola would have his meal - he was staying in the hotel upstairs - and then sit at the table Marie McCarthy reserved for herself and have a drink with her. They became friends. And when Marie's boyfriend Gerrit came back from a business trip he liked Garry Korrkola as well and Korkola continued to sit at the owner's table when he had finished his meal.

Korkola often mentioned a friend of his called Jim, who he made out to be this amazing character living in Damascus. Jim proved a great source of conversation and anecdote in the September and October of 1980.

Neither Marie McCarthy nor Gerrit was aware that Garry Korkola was a wanted man in the United States nor did they know who Jim was. Jim arrived in November to stay in the hotel with his "wife" Ruth and he proved to be just as much fun as Korkola had promised. He talked about being in the CIA and how he was kicked out in 1972. He found out that Marie had worked for the United Nations and insisted that he had worked for the United Nations as well. Nobody would believe him when he said that he had been Idi Amin's representative there.

Jim told them all about the night he was having dinner with Amin and Amin was discussing what he was going to do with an enemy when suddenly the enemy's head was brought in on a platter. Some of the stuff he was telling them was true; but no one was sure how much. He came about three or four times to the restaurant and then went back to Damascus where he seemed to be living. He had made his mark.

It was only later that Marie and Gerrit found out that his real name wasn't Jim, that he was in fact Frank Terpil who was wanted in the United States for various arms offences and for his connections with Idi Amin and Ghaddifi.

Beirut was like the set for a movie. People were connstantly running into the restaurant saying that there was a battle raging just down the street, then everyone would hear it coming nearer and then it would stop and maybe start again. Everyone who came in was asked if they knew what was going on outside. Things were being more and more dangerous and unpredictable. It was time to get out.

Marie was also having trouble with her back and didn't think much of the treatment she was getting in Beirut. She went TO London with Gerrit who got a job as a consultant. he attended Dr Ken Kennedy for her back and was cured. So by the summer of 1981 she was able to work in London.

When Gerrit went back to Beirut, as he did for a few days in September, he met Garry Korkola who had taken over their flat in Beirut. For the first time Korkola told Gerrie the trouble he was in. One of the things he said he wanted to do was to clear his name in public, or discuss his case with the American people outside the confines of ourtroom. A newspaper interview, or even better a television interview.

Marie knew Mike Wallace, who presents the "Sixty Minutes" programme on CBS, from the time she lived in New York. She rang him and told him that he could interrview Korkola and Frank Terpil; he rang her back; he was interested. Marie and Gerrit were responsible for setting up the interview with the two men which was done in their old flat in Beirut and was due to be broadcast on Sunday 7 November.

On Saturday they got a phone call from Mike Wallace: there was a problem. Had they not heard? Korkola had been kidnapped or at least was missing and so was Frank Terpil, who was also interviewed on the "Sixty Minutes" programme (in fact Terpil had hogged the programme). McCarthy and Gerrit made a few phone calls and established that the two had indeed been kidnapped. Mike Wallace didn't know if there was a connection between his show and the kidnappings. Eventually he decided to go ahead with the show.

They had liked Korkola and they were concerned about his welfare. Marie and Gerrit also felt responsible for setting up the CBS interviews. One call they made was to Garry Korkola's wife Donna in the United States who was extremely worried about her husband and determined to go to Beirut to search for him, even though she had been there on a previous occasion and was scared to death due to the presence of various armed militias. Marie and Gerrit decided to go to Beirut with Donna Korkola to see if they could locate the two men.

The visit was fruitless and they left after ten days as nothing further could be achieved. Donna Korkola suggessted that Marie take Garry Korkola's address book which was lying around the flat and maybe contact some of his associates to see if they would know anything about his whereabouts. A few months earlier Marie and Gerrit had been given a letter by Korkola to give to a contact in Scottland Yard. Through this and through conversations with him they were aware that Korkola had contacts everywhere.

During the plane journey to Beirut Donna Korkola had informed Marie and Gerrit that Frank Terpil had a wife called Marilyn who was living in Wales and from whom he had not been divorced. Sometime afterwards, Marilyn. Terpil, who had been in touch with Donna Korkola,phoned Marie and Gerrit out of the blue, introduced herself on the phone and wanted to know if they knew where her husband was. Even after Korkola and Terpil were released - who they were kidnapped by and why remains unclear, Korkola was released on New Year's Day and Terpil early in 1982 ˆMarilyn would phone Marie and Gerrit in London every six weeks or so. Once she said she would be down in London and maybe they should meet; they met in a London hotel. ~larilyn was very interested in finding out about the other woman who was with her husband, among other things.

In the spring of 1982 news came that Garry Korkola had been arrested by Spanish police at an arms fair and was awaiting extradition in a Madrid prison. Finally, the Spanish authorities agreed to extradite him if the Americans would agree to give him a new trial. They heard no more from him. Towards the end of the year Marilyn Terpil contacted Marie and Gerrit to say she had sold up and was going back to the United States. She wanted to stay with them the night before she went; she also wanted to leave her car with them and might want them to sell it for her.

Marie McCarthy's mother in Cappoquin had had one stroke and had just suffered two heart attacks so in January 1983 when Marilyn had left, Gerrit suggested that they go to Ireland in Marilyn's car to see Marie's mother. They took the ferry over to Rosslare and were driving on the road between Rosslare and New Ross. They were approaching a garage. The price of a gallon of petrol was written up clearly. Gerrit gasped in surprise; he was shocked at the price. So shocked indeed that he missed the sign which warned of a dangerous bend and crashed Marilyn Terpil's BMW into a bridge.

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3. The town of Cappoquin

There are five McCarthys. Marie is the youngest. John lives in Bray where he works in advertising. Betty lives in Geneva where she is married. Billy works for his own company in Dublin and Joan lives in Cappoquin.

Joan has always lived in the town. She married Michael Lacey, on the hurling team the last time Waterford won an All-Ireland, and has seven children. When Marie and Gerrit left Cappoquin for London in January 1983 they left innstructions with Joan that a local mechanic John Lucas would go up to New Ross and get the car. He meant to go one week, then the next. Time passed. The gardai in New Ross became interested in the car which had seemingly been abandoned. They took the number to check the idenntity of the owner.

The owner was Marilyn Terpil, wife of international gun runner, fugitive, friend of Idi Arnin , Frank Terpil.

The gardai had no name or address for the two people who had been in the car when it crashed. The only thing the gardai knew was that the two people had taken a taxi to Cappoquin. So the gardai, in their infinite wisdom, began. a house to house search in Cappoquin looking for an English couple who had visited the town in January. They finally arrived at Joan Lacey's house and began to ask questions. Was she sure that the man who had been with her sister was Dutch or was it possible that he might have been an American ...

Joan phoned Marie and asked her what in the name of God was going on.

John Lucas, the mechanic, went to New Ross to pick up the car only to be taken to Waterford by gardai and quesstioned for two hours. Among other things he was asked if he knew anything about Idi Amin. He came back to Cappooquin and went to see Joan.

Joan phoned Marie once more and asked her what in the name of God was going on.

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4. John McCarthy listens to Mike Murphy

John McCarthy, Marie's older brother who works in adverrtising in Bray, had been away with his wife and child in the Canary Islands when Marie and Gerrit came over to see his mother in Cappoquin. So he hadn't seen them. However, they contacted him after the John Lucas/Idi Amin incident in Waterford. They asked him to find out what the gardai wanted to know about the car. John McCarthy didn't know what to do. He couldn't just phone up the gardai and ask them straight out. Anyway, he didn't know any gardai, Frank Kilfeather of the Irish Times was a friend of his so he phoned him to ask him what to do. Kilfeather wasn't there. He phoned back a few times. Kilfeather still wasn't in. He really didn't know what to do. He had the thing on his mind and wanted to get something done about it as soon as possible.

The previous week he had been driving into town when he heard Mike Murphy interviewing Gordon Thomas. Thomas was talking about his book on the Pope and seemed to know what he was talking about. He would understand who Frank Terpil was and he would have contacts among the gardai. He decided to phone Thomas and ask him if he could help.

He didn't want to give his name on the phone. In the end he called himself Bill; the minute he said it he knew it was a mistake. He had a brother called Bill, but once he gave the code name he decided not to complicate things by changing it. His brother Bill was to take a dim view of what would happen over the coming week and has not spoken to John McCarthy since then. John McCarthy arrranged to phone Gordon Thomas the following Saturday morning.

It was the weekend of the Ireland-England rugby match and John McCarthy had friends staying with him for the match but he managed to phone Thomas on Saturday morning as arranged. Thomas told him that his sister was in a very serious situation, that he had spoken to contacts in Washington. John McCarthy became very worried. Marie had no phone at home; so John couldn't contact her over the weekend.

On Saturday night he went to see Thomas in Ashford.

There was another man in the room who was introduced as an associate of Thomas. He was called Paul Loughlin. Gordon Thomas told John McCarthy that his sister's life was in danger and he mentioned the possibility of her ending up like Calvi on Brackfriars Bridge. John McCarthy became very concerned but he still couldn't contact his sister. On Sunday he went to see Thomas again. Thomas told him that the situation was really serious and that he himself, John McCarthy, could even be in danger. They decided that they would phone Marie from Thomas's house the next morning.

"You don't understand how big this is," Thomas said to John McCarthy. It was Monday morning and McCarthy was going to phone his sister to tell her that she was in big trouble and she'd better come to Ireland.

Thomas suggested that they film John telling Marie to come home so that they would have a record of what happpened if the worst came to the worst. John spoke to her first and told her that there were fears for her safety and that she should come home. Thomas spoke to her as well and said he would send a plane forher. It was arranged that she would bring what documents she had relating to Garry Korkola and Frank Terpil,

When John McCarthy came off the phone having been filmed speaking to his sister he was approached by Eleanor Donovan of RTE's Today Tonight who was in the room when the filming was done. She gave him a form to sign. He saw RTE's name on the form, Up to this he had not been aware that RTE had anything to do with what was going on, although RTE say they had made him aware of this. He asked what the hell this had to do with RTE. If his sister was in danger, he felt that she would surely be in even more danger if RTE were to broadcast her problems to the world.

John McCarthy left Thomas's house, went home and tried unsuccessfully to contact Marie. He didn't know what to do. It seemed to him that he should have been told that RTE was there when he phoned his sister. He tried to phone a solicitor friend to ask for advice but Gerry Sheehan, who he knew from tennis, wasn't there. John McCarthy's wife Martha phoned a friend who was a former barrister and he recommended solicitor Roger Ballagh, McCarthy went to see Ballagh. Loughlin and Donovan flew to London.

If Marie was flying in on a private plane to Dublin Airrport that night, then it was important to meet her and tell her about RTE's involvement. The private plane, he knew, was to fly from Heathrow to Dublin. 11cCarthy and his wife went to the airport to wait for Marie.

The night wore on. They became the last people waiting in the airport building. It was after midnight. Yes, the air port still expected a small private plane coming from Heath row. It would be in around one. Around one they saw it land and they could see Marie descend on to the runway They waited at the arrivals gate for her. They waited there for two hours but she didn't appear. They drove back to Bray.

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5. A meeting in the Rembrant

"I have nothing. How can they think that?" Marie McCarthy was talking to Gordon Thomas on the phone. He was telling her that she was being sought by the Special Branch, Scottland Yard, the CIA. They were looking for information about Frank Terpil, they were looking for documents. She was also in danger from the other side because of what she knew about Terpil. There were two phone calls that day, Monday 21 March. The second was Thomas on his own who told her not to go to the police, that they would plant stuff on her, that it was better to com e to Ireland first, that he could help her, that he couldn't really talk to her on the phone but he knew a lot more about the trouble she was in.

She was puzzled. Gerrit was away so she couldn't talk to him. She had no documents of any significance in her posssession. She had met Frank Terpil only three or four times and on those occasions she didn't even know he was Frank Terpil. But if the police in Ireland were looking for her then she should go there and clear matters up. She arranged to go to the Rembrandt Hotel that night at eight o'clock and meet two people Thomas was sending to pick her up.

The Rembrandt Hotel in Thurloe Place opposite the Victoria and Albert Museum was used regularly by the Today Tonight team at that time. When Paul Loughlin and Eleanor Donovan came into the hotel they found Marie McCarthy already there. Loughlin went to the bar to get drinks.

"Do you work for Gordon Thomas?" she asked Eleanor Donovan. "Well sort of," was the reply. Marie asked her what she meant by "sort of'. "I do sometimes but I don't really work for him full time," she said. "Well, who do you work for?" she asked again. But there was no information forthcoming. Marie McCarthy said that if they wouldn't tell her who they were that she was going to go. She reached for her coat. Eleanor Donovan was anxious that she didn't go until Paul came back from the bar. Paul would tell her everything.

Immediately Paul came back he told her that they were from Today Tonight and explained that this was an Irish current affairs programme. Marie McCarthy said that as far as she was concerned there was no story until she went to Ireland and found out what the police wanted her for.

They agreed that they would do nothing 'until Marie McCarthy saw the police in Ireland. Loughlin added that they were not those sort of journalists who would go ahead with any old story. He added that Gordon Thomas had told them that she was in very great danger and was being sought by the CIA and Scotland Yard.

Paul Loughlin also said that he had been down in New Ross that day for a look at the crashed car and there were four Special Branch men guarding it.

Marie McCarthy was still uneasy about the two represenntatives from Today Tonight, as they were with her. After a while she decided, no, she'd go over later in the week and talk to the police. She didn't want to go to Dublin on a private plane that night. Her boyfriend was away, she was slightly confused, she wanted to think. Her two companions had a problem: Today Tonight had hired a private plane which was waiting at Heathrow. If Marie McCarthy didn't come with them the expense of hiring the plane would have been in vain.

Paul asked Eleanor to try and get Gordon Thomas on the phone from the hotel. She came back a few minutes later and called Paul to the phone. After a while the two of them came back and told Marie that Gordon Thomas had said that since they left Dublin he had received new inforrmation and things were worse. There was no doubt at all but her life was definitely in danger.

She decided to go to Dublin with them after all. She phoned the night security guard at work to leave a message saying that she wouldn't be in the following day. She did not say where she was going.

They hailed a taxi outside the hotel. As it was turning around Marie McCarthy noticed that Paul Loughlin seemed to be speaking to two men who were standing close by. She asked him who these men were. "It's okay," he told her, "they are the cameramen with us." She became agitated about the possibility of being filmed, but was assured that there was no problem as they had already given their promise that there would be no story whatsoever until she had cleared things up with the police and then only with her permission.

Marie McCarthy and Eleanor Donovan liked each other less and less. McCarthy seemed really scared in the small plane and Donovan wondered how someone who had repuutedly been all over the world could be so afraid of flying. She thought McCarthy was faking it. There was a strong wind and it was a difficult flight in the small plane.

It was after one when they reached Dublin Airport.

There were two cars waiting on the tarmac. One was a taxi which took Marie McCarthy and Eleanor Donovan to Ashhford. Paul Loughlin went separately to RTE. They did not go through the airport building. McCarthy suggested that she was tired and wouldn't it be better if she stayed in her brother's house in Bray and see Thomas in the morning. Eleanor Donovan told her that the Special Branch was watching her brother's house.

It was almost two thirty when they arrived at Gordon Thomas's house. He was standing at the door in his dressing gown. There were two huge dogs at his side. Until the preevious day Marie McCarthy had never heard of Gordon Thomas and even at this stage was unaware that he had written a book about the Pope.

"You are so stupid," he said to her the minute she had got out of the taxi. "Everything you do is making it worse for yourself." Marie was tired and frightened; she didn't understand. What did he mean? He told her. She'd dyed her hair; someone would notice that she was trying to disguise herself.

True, she'd dyed her hair. But she'd always dyed her hair, from her twenties onwards when she had started to go grey. She couldn't understand what he meant.

He had told her on the phone that his contacts had told him that Frank Terpil was in the United States. Now he began to ask her about Terpil and where he was. She said she didn't know. He insisted. Eleanor Donovan was in the room all this time. "He could be down the road for all I know," Marie said, Thomas listened to this carefully. He asked if she meant that he was seeking an Irish passport.

The next thing Thomas said came as a surprise. He told Marie McCarthy that he had heard from high level sources in Washington that Gerrit, her boyfriend, was in the CIA. Marie simply knew this wasn't true and from this moment on she became suspicious of Thomas and his sources.

He was still talking and it was getting late. "Of course you realise," he said, "that this Pope is the most political of all Popes." Marie McCarthy did not understand why Thomas was telling her this in the middle of the night. Thomas then told her it would be wiser of her to let him see her papers before the police did. She refused. Paul Loughlin had by this time arrived and he and Eleanor Donovan left. Marie McCarthy wanted to go to bed.

Thomas helped her to make up the bed in the back beddroom. She was shaking, she couldn't sleep. After a while Thomas rushed into the room and said he had just received a call from London in which someone said: "We know you have Marie McCarthy there," and hung up. He asked her who she had told she was coming to his house and she said nobody. He asked her again to see her papers, but again she refused.

When he returned he was almost hysterical. He had had another call. This time it was from the police and they were on their way down from Dublin to arrest her. Marie McCarthy broke down. She began to cry. She told Thomas that she wasn't worried about herself as she would be able to clear everything up with the police, but she was worried about the effect any controversy would have on her mother. Thomas patted her hand and told her she was just a frighhtened little girl worried about her sick mother. Again he asked her if he could look at her papers. She was still crying, she told him no, she wanted to talk to the police when they came.

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6. Breakfast at Ashford

It became bright. At eight o'clock Gordon Thomas came back and said Marie had better get up quickly before the police arrived. She noticed her papers were gone. As soon as she left her room she noticed them on a table in the house. She felt sick. Thomas's children were running around the house, his wife was in hospital at that time. Breakfast was served. Marie sat at the table and Thomas talked but she couldn't eat. He wanted her to come for a walk around the garden, she wanted to call the police. He said she was beehaving in a very stupid way for a supposedly intelligent woman and she should talk to him and tell her full story before she went to the police.

They went into Thomas's office and Thomas introduced her to Denis Bergin, his personal photographer. The phone rang; it was John McCarthy looking for Marie. Marie told John she would see him as soon as she could. She didn't want to wait for him to arrive. She wanted to get out there and then. Thomas told him not to come down. Marie said she wanted to call the police in Waterford to talk to them about the car. Thomas said there wouldn't be anyone at the police station until 9.30. She phoned anyway, the garda who answered the phone in Waterford didn't know about Marie or the car but said he would ring back.

She noticed that Denis Bergin had his cameras with him and began fiddling with them; she insisted that she didn't want to be photographed.

Two Spanish journalists arrived for an interview with Thomas; they had also been there when John McCarthy was there the previous day. Thomas suggested that Bergin should try and take a photograph of the Spanish photoographer photographing him. McCarthy noticed that Bergin was trying to get her into the photo as well and moved away. When she really insisted that she wanted to leave, Bergin said his car was broken, she said she would take a taxi but Thomas said there were no taxis in the area. Thomas said it would look to the Special Branch as though she was running away and what would he tell the Waterford police when they phoned back. Marie said she would ring them from her brother's house. She asked the Spanish jourrnalist if she would drive her, but just then Paul Loughlin arrived. Thomas walked out of the door ahead of her toowards the car. McCarthy noticed Denis Bergin taking a photograph of the two of them. This photograph would later be printed in the Sunday Press.

Marie McCarthy also noticed the television cameramen in front of the car. She wanted to go. She roared at Gordon Thomas and told him he was a tramp. "Paul, get this woman out of here," he said. "I want nothing more to do with her. She is crazy."

When she got into Loughlin's car, she put her coat over her face as the cameras were still pointing at her. Loughlin told her that she had been filmed the previous night in the hotel in London.

They didn't speak until they got to Bray. "Who next are you going to try and sell your story to?" Loughlin asked. "I have not tried to sell my story to anybody," she said. He dropped her at her brother's house and waited in the car. Nobody came to the door. Marie went over to the car: "Why are you waiting?" she asked. He told her he was waiting to see if she wanted to get back into the car since there was nobody there. She refused.

She went to a neighbour's, said who she was and asked to use the phone. The neighbour didn't have a phone but insisted that Marie come in. Eventually it was ascertained that the McCarthys' au pair was in fact in John McCarthy's house but had been told not to answer the door. Marie went into the house and rang Thomas to know If her brother was there; Thomas said he wasn't. She rang the gardai in Waterford and asked if they knew anything about her at this stage, they didn't butsaid they would ring her at the new number she gave.

She then rang the Special Branch. She wanted to talk to somebody and explained it was urgent. She couldn't explain on the phone. They would have to send someone out.

She wanted to talk to someone in person. It was urgent.

Detective Gay Tiernan from the Special Branch arrived at around half past twelve. John McCarthy and his wife had arrived back before that. Marie McCarthy told him the story of her life and the details of the past few days. She gave him the documents she had brought with her from Thomas's house. Tiernan told her he had never heard of her, but there were a lot of men in the Special Branch and he would have to check.

At five o'clock Thomas rang John McCarthy to say that Marie had forgotten some papers and when John offered to collect them Thomas said he would only give them to Marie personally or to the police.

That night at about ten Gay Tiernan returned with a colleague to say that Marie McCarthy was not wanted by the police in Washington, the UK or Ireland other than the police in Waterford about the car. He returned her file and said she had no reason to worry and he was unable to underrstand what the fuss was about. They went to bed much relieved.

The next day was Wednesday and Joan phoned once more from Cappoquin to know what in the name of God was going on. She was genuinely disturbed. This time the Today Tonight team had been down in Cappoquin and had tried to interview her. They told her that Marie had worked in a restaurant for Frank Terpil and had been involved in gun-running. Later in the day a local garda who was a friend of the family came to the house to say that he had heard from the gardai in Waterford that a big story was going to break on RTE on Friday night about gun running and that there was a connection with the McCarthy family from Cappoquin and be prepared for some problems. Joan didn't know what to say.

Marie rang Gay Tiernan again in the Special Branch but he was off. She spoke to a Detective Michael Gaynor and he agreed to come out and see her. He arrived with a collleague at about nine. Marie told them that Thomas still had some papers belonging to her and that these were important as they related to the ownership of the car. Michael Gaynor suggested that she phone Thomas and ask for them. It was agreed that he would listen on the extension in the upstairs bedroom.

Thomas was not at home. He was in Hunter's Hotel in Ashford. The phone there was engaged. They waited for a while and then decided to call Thomas's house and ask for him to phone when he got home. The phone was answered by Thomas himself.

"Is that you, Gordon?" "Yes, who is that?"

"Marie McCarthy, just hold on a minute." Marie McCarthy ran into the livingroom and told Detective Mick Gaynor of the Special Branch that she had Gordon Thomas and he was to go to the extension.

Marie asked Thomas if she could come and collect the papers. He told her she was dangerous, he was afraid of her, he didn't want her near him. She told him she wanted the papers. He said he had personally taken them to Dublin Castle that morning. Who did he give them to? "I'm telling you nothing, you are dangerous," he said. She asked if she was still in trouble with the Special Branch. "Yes, you are in big trouble with the Special Branch," he replied. She asked him again for the name of the man he gave the papers to. He refused.

At this stage Michael Gaynor interrupted the conversaation. He told Thomas who he was and asked him to give the name of the man he gave the papers to. Thomas kept saying he couldn't hear. Detective Gaynor gave his name three times and said he was from the Special Branch. Thomas then denied he said he brought them to Dublin Castle and said he had posted them to Dublin Castle. He was then asked what address he had put on the envelope. Then he said he had not posted them to the Castle but had posted them to London to Marie McCarthy's address. Gaynor pointed out to him that he had given three different accounts of what he had done with the papers. He told him he was sending someone down to him. Thomas said his gate would be locked. Gaynor said there would be someone down within an hour and Thomas could open his gate.

Thomas made a number of phone calls. He rang Paul Loughlin in RTE who sent a camera crew out to film the arrival of the police. He also rang his solicitor Donough o 'Connor who tried to talk to Marie McCarthy just after midnight but John McCarthy hung up on him. Thomas also rang John McCarthy: "John, are you still impersonating a Special Branch man," he said. He also rang Wicklow Garda Station to report an anonymous telephone call he had reeceived and he linked Marie McCarthy with this. When two detectives arrived the following morning to question Marie McCarthy about it she told them the whole story. That night, Thursday, a number of men from the Special Branch arrived and Marie McCarthy and her brother gave them a full statement. The police left at half past one. The McCarthys were relieved that their ordeal was over.

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7. The Irish Media

Their ordeal was not over, however, and they realised this as soon as they turned on the television the following day, Friday. RTE was advertising that evening's Today Tonight. What was the connection between a car crash in New Ross and the attempted assassination of the Pope? asked the trailer for the programme. Marie and John McCarthy were horrified and contacted Roger Ballagh to ask him to check with RTE that the programme was not about them and if it concerned them to make clear to RTE that they had not cooperated. He phoned Today Tonight and was told that the programme not only had national but international siggnificance and the public had a right to know.

It was the largest audience a Today Tonight programme has ever had. It was also one of the most incoherent proogrammes Today Tonight has made. It did not establish that Marie McCarthy knew Frank Terpil, nor that Terpil had trained the Pope's assassin, nor that Marie McCarthy was in danger. It failed to make any point at all.

Marie McCarthy was in her brother's house in Bray when the programme was shown, presented by Pat Kenny with great gusto; she cried all during the programme. The main problem was her mother: herself and John hoped that her mother wouldn't see it. Her mother was in Dublin visiting their other brother. She did see it. She was really shocked at the implication that her daughter had been involved in an attempt to assassinate the Pope. She knew nothing about the events of the previous few days.

The McCarthys in Bray stayed up all night talking about the programme, and what it was going to mean. How would the family be viewed in Cappoquin or: anywhere else. How could they face their mother? One sister, Betty, has still not spoken to them nor has one brother, Billy.

Various representatives of the media turned up in Cappooquin to interview Joan, the sister of what they called the "Pope plot girl". A local nun said to a relative that Marie had always been bold and it was her mother's fault for not imposing more discipline on her as a child. John and Marie wondered if they could ever go back to Cappoquin again.

On Saturday John bought the Evening Press. There was more. A big ad for more revelations about the Pope and the car crash in the next day's Sunday Press. They couldn't wait. Once more Roger Ballagh was contacted. He phoned Vincent Jennings, the editor of the Sunday Press. Jennings told him that the article was going ahead. Ballagh, he told him, could read it on Sunday and sue on Monday, but he could not interfere with the article. John's wife Martha went looking for the Sunday Press in Bray on Saturday night. She couldn't find it and drove into Dublin to get it. They were eagerly waiting for the paper when she got home.

"What Has A Car Crash In Wexford To Do With A Plot To Kill The Pope?" asked the headline on page six. It was a big headline right across the page with a big photo of Marie McCarthy and Gordon Thomas, taken on Tuesday morning, at the top of the page.

Some things in the article were definitely wrong: Marie McCarthy could not have guided Gordon Thomas through her papers for "twelve hours"; she was only in his house for seven hours. Gerrit is not "burly", he is skinny. The dossier she brought with her was not green; it was black. Marie left Thomas's house on Tuesday morning March 22 alright and he adds: "She did not tell me where she was going". She did; she told him she was going to her brother's house just up the road in Bray. And two days later he spoke to her and a member of the Special Branch on the phone from there. "If she reads this," he wrote, "she should really give herself up." Give herself up?

The file Marie McCarthy brought to Dublin with her contained a lot of information about Frank Terpil. She had collected press cuttings about his career over a period of time. She found some photographs and a fake will Terpil had written in Beirut. But there was nothing new about Terpil in the file, nothing that any police force anywhere would be interested in. Also in the file were a few things relating to Garry Korkola, who was not alleged to have had any involvement in the plot to kill the Pope, thus this inforrmation, an address book from Beirut, a few letters - could not have been any use to those interested in the plot to kill the Pope.

The opening paragraph' of the article reads: "A car mishap on an Irish road has raised the shattering spectre that the US Central Intelliigence Agency is implicated in the plot to assassinate Pope John Paul II in Rome in May 1981." From reading the article in the Sunday Press it is impossible to see how this conclusion is drawn.

The article reproduces a list of toys in Marie's possession which,the article says, were "a cover for an arms maniifest" The list was, in fact, a list of toys for a children's party which was to be held in South Lebanon at Christtmas 1979.

The day before the Sunday Press article came out Marie McCarthy conntacted the Sunday Independent to tell them that the story on Today Tonight and the story being advertised by the Sunday Press were rubbish. The Indo responded by printing her denials with a lead story under the banner headline: "Irish Girl Denies Pope Plot Link". There was also a large photograph of Frank Terpil.

This was replied to the following week in the Sunday Press by Gordon Thomas who outlined what he believed had happened in his relations with Marie and John McCarthy. "The Sunday Independent," he wrote, "enngaged in the kind of reporting of the story that simply gives journalists a bad name." John McCarthy came to him, he said, with a story about his sister who was frightened for her life, McCarthy was immediately told of the RTE involvement and agreed to it, Marie McCarthy told of her close relaationship with Frank Terpil, Thomas was able to conclude from what she told that Terpil had been in the CIA when they trained Ali Agca to shoot. He at no stage gives any evidence of how he was able to conclude this nor why he should believe it if she had told him.

"In all four conversations with John McCarthy and his sister, Loughhlin and myself were told that she knew Terpil and his wife Marilyn 'intimaately'." This suggests that Marie knew Terpil and his wife together. Indeed they are referred to in other parts of the Thomas article as the "Terpils". Marie had never met them together; they lived apart; anyway, she knew neither of them intimately.

By the time the second Sunday Press article appeared Marie was beyond caring anyway. She had managed to meet her mother and explain that there was no truth in the stories. She had lain low. Her brother John, who makes his living from a connection with a semi-state body, was approached by the' body who investigated his account of what happened and after a while found it to be satisfactory. He had been worried about this, he could have lost his job because of the programme.

On the Sunday night after the Today Tonight programme, the day of the first Sunday Press article, a senior garda in the Special Branch drove out to the McCarthys' house in Bray and told them that he was sitting at home thinking about what the media had done to them and had decided to come out in his own time, off duty, to say that if there was ever anything he could do for them to help them prove that what had been printed about them was untrue, he would.

On Thursday Marie went to London.

All the way on the train she had to talk to the woman beside her using another name and another identity. She was afraid in case anyone would recognise who she was. Her telephone number had been printed in the Sunday Press and her address had been given on Today Tonight so she moved flat and put the furniture into storage. She lost her deposit on the flat but that was the least of her worries.

She told the people she was working for that she couldn't work for them any more. At first she didn't explain why, but when she did they gave her their full support. The Sunday Press said she had been in hiding since the car crash; they knew she had been at work every day as usual. Gerrit came back and she explained what had happened. The best thing to do was to get away for a while. She went to the Canary Islands for a fortnight, but only stayed for a week. She couldn't stop thinking about it.

The editor of the Sunday Press, Vincent Jennings, stands over the Sunday Press articles. Today Tonight is embarrassed by the programme:

"If you came in and said the world was ending and mentioned that Gordon Thomas was the source," one prooducer on the programme says, "you would be moved to the Angelus." •