The government is delaying a decision on when to introduce legislation to provide pensions to the two judges and the senior court official who resigned over the Sheedy affair until it sees how they respond to requests to explain their actions, senior sources have said.
The chairman of the Oireachtas Committee on Justice, Equality and Women's Rights, Mr Eoin Ryan TD, wrote to the three on Friday inviting them to appear before the committee on May 6th. If they appear, they will be asked why they took the actions that led to the release from jail of Philip Sheedy, convicted of drink driving causing death.
Ministers, increasingly frustrated at the failure to ascertain fully the motivation of the three men, decided last week not to choose a date for the legislation required to approve their pensions, it has emerged. The necessary legislation would have to be produced and brought through the Oireachtas by the Minister for Justice, Mr O'Donoghue, a Department of Finance spokeswoman said last week.
Mr Ryan's letters of invitation to appear before the committee were sent to former Supreme Court judge Mr Hugh O'Flaherty, former High Court judge Mr Cyril Kelly and former Dublin County Registrar of the Circuit Court, Mr Michael Quinlan.
The letters also advised them of their rights and the limitations on what they can say at the committee. It told them they were being asked to attend voluntarily, as under present legislation they cannot be compelled to appear. It also informed them that they cannot claim immunity or privilege in relation to anything they might say at the committee.
Under existing legislation, witnesses, unlike members of the committee, can be left open to prosecution or action for defamation arising out of anything they might say at a committee meeting.
Mr Ryan said last night that he hoped the three would respond positively to the invitation. "If they don't want to come in, we will have to consider the situation", he said. It is likely that in that event the committee will ask the Government to consider giving it powers to compel the three to attend. Present legislation exempts judges and former judges from the committee's power to compel witnesses to attend.
Meanwhile, the Sunday Tribune reported yesterday that Mr Joe Burke, a former Dublin city councillor and a close associate of the Taoiseach, Mr Ahern, had a significant business relationship with Sheedy. As an architect, Sheedy acted in a private capacity on behalf of Mr Burke, a builder, on a number of projects, and designed an extension to Mr Burke's house.
Sheedy was also a witness during a High Court civil action last January in which a Co Dublin publican sued Mr Burke for breach of contract. Mr Burke visited Sheedy in Shelton Abbey prison on October 14th, 1998. The case against Mr Burke, according to the report, was originally listed for a week later, October 21st. However, the case was not reached on the High Court list for that day and was relisted for the January sitting.
Mr Burke has recently refused to comment on his connections with Sheedy. However, before publication of the Chief Justice's report into the affair, he told the Star newspaper he just happened to be in Arklow at the time he called to see Philip Sheedy.
Fianna Fail Senator Don Lydon confirmed last night that he was the author of the psychologist's report on Sheedy which was considered by Judge Joseph Mathews when he sentenced Sheedy to four years' imprisonment in October 1997. Senator Lydon told The Irish Times last night that he wrote the report as a result of a "normal referral", that it was a private matter and that his solicitor had said he should answer no further questions about it.