Alan Shatter (above) will make a statement on whether he is accepting the €70,000 severance pay he gets for being sacked resigning as Justice Minister at 3pm on the plinth at Leinster House today
An hour after the election broadcasting moratorium. For maximum damage impact to his former cabinet colleagues.
Fight!
Shatter to give statement on severance payment (RTE)
(Photocall ireland)
John Mooney, security correspondent with The Sunday Times
Last night on RTÉ’s Late Debate, the Sunday Times Security Correspondent John Mooney – who broke the GSOC bugging story – spoke to presenter Audrey Carville about Justice Minister Alan Shatter’s resignation.
Audrey Carville: “John Mooney, you’re puzzled by Alan Shatter’s resignation, why?”
John Mooney: “I’m very reluctant to believe anything that I’m being told about these matters because none of it makes sense and you can’t take. You can’t forget the events that have preceded this and what’s been happening, really since Alan Shatter came to power and if I can just maybe take you through various controversies. You have the Garda collusion matter regarding Kieran Boylan colluding with drug trafficker. Alan Shatter got a huge report on that, took no action on that. The Labour party and Fine Gael supported them in that. Anyone who has the remotest knowledge of that particular affair would have been left absolutely stunned and hence, there was a feeling developed, of confidence, in Garda headquarters that you could do whatever you wanted and nothing’s going to happen to you. So that’s the first thing. Secondly you had the GSOC bugging affair.
That investigation was established before the Guerin one but hasn’t reported – that’s a bit odd. You had the penalty points issue, where Alan Shatter, as we all remember stood on the plinth outside the Dáil, and I’ve said this on this programme and Prime Time and others and berated the two whistleblowers, regardless of whether they were wrong or right and basically accused them of wrongdoing. Then we had the charade that happened concerning the investigation by John O’Mahony into those issues. Subsequently that was shown to be, I mean, worthless. Now John O’Mahony is the Assistant Garda Commissioner in charge of crime and security – he’s in charge of our national security. It doesn’t get much higher than that in Garda headquarters.
Still, no action whatsoever from the Government in relation to this matter. Then you have the allegations made by Maurice McCabe, concerning, which are the subject of the Guerin report, which are very specific allegations and, again, that was passed to Enda Kenny because Alan Shatter wasn’t seen to be someone who could be trusted to deal with this. Now, it should be stated, at every point in this, Labour and Fine Gael have fully supported Alan Shatter – even when the facts were screaming from the rooftops. This is not a matter of the Government arranging investigations that have exposed weaknesses or flaws. The Government [have] done their damndest to cover for this and cover up this type of activity and, indeed, suppress any information coming out in relation to it, so it’s very important that people understand this.”
Carville: “Are you saying you don’t buy that he’s resigining over the Guerin…”
Mooney: “I’m very wary of everything that is being said in relation to these matters. For the simple reason is, is that then Government has been playing ducks and drakes in regards to the truth of these matters for so long that I don’t think they understand the truth, or can decipher from the lies that have been told. For example, this letter which is Alan Shatter’s resignation letter, apparently on the basis of what’s likely to emerge in the Guerin report, it’s very, very odd, in so far that it comes across to me as a letter that was written almost after someone had been told they have to go or else they’ll be dismissed. Because, the first thing it does, is it drags in the Garda Ombudsman yet again, said that it had not cooperated…”
Carville: “GSOC?”
Mooney: “Yeah..with the Guerin inquiry into these matters and hadn’t furnished it with, Seán Guerin, with the papers relating to this matter. The most incredible thing about this is GSOC tonight have confirmed that that’s the case, that they didn’t actually provide Guerin with the documents in relation to this, citing privacy and other reasons. So you’re into this kind of very, very odd, sort of wordplay on this. I’m not sure, I think, if you…I’ll go back to the question I raised before. Martin Callinan resigned or retired, whatever word you want to use, a number of weeks ago, for reasons that are unclear. Now Alan Shatter is after resigning, again, or whether he was pushed , for reasons that are very unclear.
The tone of this letter isn’t one of abject apology to John Wilson or people like that. It’s more, it’s creating more questions almost to what it answers and I’d just be very, very cautious. There are things, matters going on in the background to these issues, in Garda headquarters and in the Department of Justice, and in the Department of An Taoiseach that I don’t think the public are aware of yet.”
Listen back in full here
Previously: Holy Shatt
Meanwhile…
“Mr [Sean] Guerin has raised some legal issues that need to be addressed in advance of the publication of the report. These are currently being considered by the Attorney General, however I can advise the House that the report is critical of the inadequacy of the actions taken by a number of agencies, notably an Garda Síochana but also including the Department of Justice and Equality and the Minister for Justice.”
Enda Kenny in the dail today.
Oh.
Fergus O’Neil writes:
“In an alternate reality this is painted on a gable wall in west Ballinteer….”
The original.
[Alan Shatter and Mick Wallace on RTE 1’s Prime Time ]
The Data Protection Commissioner has found that the Minister for Justice Alan Shatter has broken the law by disclosing personal information about Mick Wallace on de telly
From the BS vaults [May 16, 2013]:
Alan Shatter: “As Deputy Wallace knows, even without…in issuing tickets, the Gardaí exercised discretion. Deputy Wallace himself was stopped with a mobile, on a mobile phone last May, by members of An Garda Síochána and he was advised by the guard who stopped him that a fixed ticket charge could issue and you would be, he could be given penalty points. But the garda apparently, as I’m advised…”
Pat Kenny: “Used his discretion.”
Shatter: “Used his discretion and warned him and told him not to do it again.”
Pat Kenny: “Mick? Mick? The guard used his discretion?”
Wallace: “I tell you what, first of all that’s news to me. Secondly, right, with regard to discretion…”
Kenny: “You don’t recall that incident?”
Wallace: “I don’t know. Listen with regard to discretion. It’s all very well to say they’re using discretions here and there but in actual fact, once the, the rule is once it goes on the system, they should go to court to deal with it. Now listen..”
Kenny: “By the way, are you not concerned that the minister should know about your private business dealing with the Gardaí?”
Wallace: “I’m not, I’m not remotely worried about what the minister knows.”
Shatter breaks data protection law on Mick Wallace (RTE)
Previously: How Did He Know?
Meanwhile…
Tut tut. Despite Alan Shatter describing my story as “inaccurate”, it is indeed 100pc true. DPC final findings expected to say the same.
— Niamh Horan (@NiamhHoran) May 4, 2014
Fair play though in fairness.
It’s been reported this morning that the family of murdered priest Fr Niall Molloy have asked Justice Minister Alan Shatter to clarify if any garda phone calls relating to the unsolved murder in 1985 were recorded.
In the Irish Daily Mail (not available online), Maresa Fagan reports:
“The family of Fr Molloy have expressed concern over the possible recording of calls between family members or their lawyers and gardaí over the past 28 years. Bill Maher, a nephew of Fr Molloy, has contacted Mr Shatter to seek clarification on whether gardaí are holding recordings of any such conversations related to the killing in Clara, Co. Offaly, in July 1985. Mr Maher has also requested that any such recordings from 1985 onwards, or more recently since the Fr Molloy cold case was re-opened, be furnished to the family.”
Previously: When He Was In Justice
The Army Bomb disposal unit at Rathfarnham Garda Station this morning after an investigation of a suspicious package addressed to Justice Minister Alan Shatter got under way. The package was intercepted at a Dublin Post Office.
Suspicious package to Alan Shatter prompts evacuation of Garda station (Irish Examiner)
Pics via House Hatcher and Cathal McMahon
Lucia O’Farrell
Lucia O’Farrell appeared on TV3’s Tonight With Vincent Browne Show last night to discuss the case of her son Shane who was killed by a hit-and-run driver outside Carrickmacross, Co. Monaghan on August 2, 2011
The man who struck Shane was Zigimantas Gridzuiska, 39, from Lithuania.
He was acquitted of dangerous driving causing death and he was given the choice of eight months in jail or to leave Ireland within 21 days. He chose the latter with appalling consequences.
Later, Senator David Norris said he had contacted Justice Minister Alan Shatter about the case. and was told the family might consider counselling.
Lucia O’Farrell: “Shane was 23, he returned from college and he was to take part in a triathlon and, after having something to eat, he went out on his bike, a beautiful summer’s evening on the second of August 2011. When he hadn’t returned, Jim, my husband, and I went out and found that he had been killed in a hit and run. He was our only son, our lives had been destroyed but he was tossed on the road and left to die alone on the road in a hit and run. We were told it was a crime scene. They had nobody at the time for it.”
Vincent Browne: “And you were told that he was carried on the roof of the car for quite a distance?”
O’Farrell: “That subsequently came out in the court because they found fabrics of this clothing on the roof bonnet and windscreen of the car.”
Browne: “Right and the person who almost certainly was involved in this was a Lithuanian and he had a track record, prior to then, tell us a bit about that.”
O’Farrell: “He had come into the country, apparently he was known to Interpol. He was up for convictions for aggravated burglary, theft, road traffic offences, damage to property…”
Browne: “That was outside the country, before coming here?”
O’Farrell: “Yes, yes, and then he had 40 convictions in total on the evening of the second of August, when he killed Shane.”
Browne: “That was in Ireland?”
O’Farrell: “No, in Lithuania, Northern Ireland and here.”
Browne: “Right.”
O’Farrell: “He was well-known to the PSNI, he had served custody in the south of Ireland for heroin, he had a long criminal history, he was on a peace bond, he was on a suspended sentence, north and south of the Border, he was driving a defective vehicle, he was uninsured, he had falsified his documents since coming into the country…”
Browne: “And wasn’t there an instance where he was given a suspended sentence, subject to good behaviour, and then he was convicted of another offence and the judge in the second case was unaware of what had happened previously. The gardai failed to tell them.”
O’Farrell: “Well the reason Shane is dead is because of total Garda failure. In January 2011, seven months before Shane was killed, this man had received a ten-month sentence and it was adjourned for a year in the Circuit Court, for him to be of good behaviour with permission to bring him back at any stage if he reoffended, but four months after that decision in the Circuit Court, and I saw that order, he was up for five consecutive days of theft in another court room and the judge was unaware that he was to be brought back and gave him a four-month suspended sentence. The guards should have brought him back when he reoffended. So he now, in May, got a four-month suspended sentence and went on to kill our son. He legally shouldn’t have been on the road.”
Browne: “Right. And subsequent to the killing of your son there were further bizarre…”
O’Farrell: “Yes there were plenty of opportunities for the guards to prevent this happening. On the 6th of July, three weeks before he killed Shane, this car was killed up by the Drugs Squad, he was well known to them and he was found with a substance and charred tinfoil. Apparently this man snorted his heroin. He would put a lighter under the tinfoil and he snorted his heroin and instead of confiscating or seizing the car and preventing him driving this man was allowed continue to drive and hold a driving licence, which a person snorting heroin behind the steering wheel of a car is not conducive, because side effects of heroin…”
Browne: “OK, and in the hours before the incident, resulting in the death of your son, the gardaí were also involved?”
O’Farrell: “He was pulled up again an hour before he killed our son because the number was known to the Drugs Squad. He was found with two other Lithuanian heroin addicts, the driver was uninsured, they took them out and searched them, this car had no NCT certificate, it was driven by an uninsured driver and they were waved on. Within an hour our son was dead.”
Browne: “Subsequent to the death of your son, there were further bizarre twists to the story?”
O’Farrell: “Following killing Shane?”Continue reading →
[Brian Purcell, Secretary General at the Department of Justice]
You may recall the letter of March 10th that former Garda Commissioner Martin Callinan sent to the Secretary General of the Department of Justice, Brian Purcell, for the attention of Justice Minister Alan Shatter.
Mr Callinan’s letter said that, during the process of discovery in the Ian Bailey’s civil action case, it emerged that telephone calls in Bandon Garda Station had been recorded, between gardaí and key witness Marie Farrell – who claimed in 2012 that gardai forced her to perjure herself in order to incriminate Mr Bailey – and journalists.
It also explains how Mr Callinan ordered for the widespread recording of calls – bar 999 calls – to be stopped on November 27, 2013.
Minister Shatter told the Dáil he never received the letter until March 25 – hours after Mr Callinan stood down from his role.
It should also be noted that Taoiseach Enda Kenny Kenny had sent Mr Purcell to Mr Callinan’s home to convey Mr Kenny’s concerns about the phone recordings on the night before Callinan stepped down, March 24.
Finian McGrath, who is a member of the Oireachtas Justice Committee, wanted Mr Purcell to come before the committee to explain what happened.
But last night the committee decided to hold off on bringing Mr Purcell in until Judge Nial Fennelly’s Commission of Inquiry set up to study the garda station tapes has its terms of reference in order.
Mr McGrath spoke to Ivan Yates on Newstalk this morning.
Finian McGrath: “Well, I have to accept first of all that I was fully surprised myself. I went went into The Justice Committee yesterday with three objectives. First of all, to get Brian Purcell in, The Secretary General and his senior civil servant. Secondly, was to get the former Garda Commissioner in. And the third, I asked the question, was, ‘Would it be in order to invite The Attorney General in?’. So at the meeting, legal advice was given that we were not allowed to call The Attorney General – and I accepted that advice. But on the other two issues, the legal advice given at The Committee was that we could go ahead, that we had the power, we had the authority, and let’s get on with it. So I proposed that we bring in those two. But the vast majority – I was the only one – everyone in The Committee said, ‘No, we’re going to park this for a week and we’re going to try and make a few decisions on the terms of reference for The Commission of Inquiry and then maybe next week. But my position was, I just wanted simple answers, I didn’t want a commission of inquiry or a justice committee, I didn’t want any additional costs – all I wanted was simple questions answered by The Secretary General – and by the way, it’s not personalising the guy, or demonising him, and there’s still issues there – the bereavement in the family over a few days – but there’s Asssistant Secretary Generals, there are other senior civil servants – just answer the question, ‘What the Hell went on and why didn’t they deal with the letter on the 10th of March?’. These are simple questions that the public are asking me to ask – and I was just blown away with what happened yesterday with the kind of …. I suspect a rat, by the way, Ivan. I was a bit concerned that they were trying to drag it out over the terms of references. I hope that this discussion over terms of references doesn’t go on for another two weeks.”
Ivan Yates: “Why was this meeting held in private?”
McGrath: “It was held in private just to see what we’d do. We wanted to make a collective decision on the way that we would approach the issue. Because some people were saying that we should… that they should completely stand back and proceed with…{interrupted}
Yates: “Finian, I don’t want to do this , but, a few months ago when we were covering the Penalty Points issue with The Public Accounts Committee, there was an attempt by Government Back Benchers to stop that entire process…”Continue reading →
[from left: Martin Callinan, Brian Purcell and Alan Shatter in 2012]
Released this evening.
Former Garda Commissioner Martin Callinan’s letter to the Secretary General at the department of Justice Brian Purcell dated March 10.
It was only after St Patrick’s Day that Justice Minister Alan Shatter was told of its contents.
Apparently.
Earlier: This A Gross Conspiracy.
Previously: Getting Their Story Straight