FG TD Michael D’Arcy distrusts Garda chief’s whistleblower account

A Government backbencher has told the Dáil he does not believe Garda Commissioner Nóirín O’Sullivan’s version of events in the whistleblower controversy.

Fine Gael Wexford TD Michael D’Arcy said he disbelieved Ms O’Sullivan “because of her actions” and echoed Opposition calls for her to step aside.

He also said he had been given information that up to 10 journalists were briefed with negative stories about Sgt McCabe.

And he said that when former head of the Garda press office Supt David Taylor alleged in protected disclosures that he had been directed to spread malicious reports about Sgt McCabe, he was arrested by the Garda Commissioner’s husband and his Garda-issued phone taken from him.

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Mr D’Arcy asked where that phone was now.

He said it was appropriate that Supt Taylor who was the subject of an investigation was on leave for the past 21 months and he had not been found guilty of anything.

“I do believe it appropriate that the Garda Commissioner steps aside,” he said.

“The interests of one individual should not come in ahead of the interests of the police force.”

He said “their names and all their reputations are to some degree in disrepute when the person at the top faces very allegations as serious as this”.

The Fine Gael TD also expressed his support for his Wexford constituency colleague and Labour leader Brendan Howlin. Mr Howlin told the Dáil on Wednesday that a journalist had told him he had direct knowledge that Ms O'Sullivan made very serious allegations of sexual crimes having been committed by Sgt McCabe.

He said Mr Howlin was not somebody “who makes things up” and he had a serious track record in relation whistleblowers, to the Morris tribunal and “the information he had was helpful”.

Allegations

Mr D’Arcy was speaking during debate on the terms of reference of the commission of investigation into allegations that the commissioner attempted to smear Sgt McCabe’s reputation.

The Wexford TD it was an “incredibly serious allegation” that a judge of the State “was incapable of saying that the most senior police person in this State was telling the truth”.

Mr D’Arcy said “I don’t believe her because of her actions and how she instructed her legal counsel to deal with the O’Neill investigation”.

“She said her counsel was given instruction to show that Garda Maurice McCabe was acting with malice, that he was getting his own back on the force and that he was unreliable.”

Mr D’Arcy said the commissioner had had the opportunity to clarify her instruction to her legal counsel, but she chose legal privilege.

The Government backbencher said “you couldn’t make it up” that “a Garda commissioner is being investigated by a Supreme Court judge, a commissioner’s husband arresting one of the people in question, the evidence being taken by the husband of the commissioner. Where is the phone in question? I don’t know.”