A man told the Special Criminal Court in Dublin yesterday that he prepared the gun used to kill journalist Veronica Guerin. Charles Bowden, the first man to give evidence under the new Witness Protection Programme, was testifying on the fifth day of the trial of Mr Patrick Eugene Holland (58), of Dublin, with an address at Brittas Bay, Co Wicklow.
Mr Holland has denied possessing cannabis for sale or supply within the State on a date unknown between October 1st, 1995, and October 6th, 1996.
The court heard that Bowden told gardai he heard three men planning to shoot Ms Guerin because another man at the centre of a drugs distribution operation was upset after she had brought assault charges against him.
Bowden said he had prepared the gun used in the shooting - a .357 Magnum pistol and 12 hollow pointed "dum dum" bullets - and had seen the gun after the shooting.
He said the gun and ammunition had been smuggled into the country with a cannabis consignment.
The 33-year old former soldier, who was jailed for six years at the Circuit Criminal Court last month for drugs and firearms offences, is the first person to give evidence under the State's witness protection programme introduced last July.
The court heard the Director of Public Prosecutions had given him "unconditional and irrevocable" immunity from prosecution for Ms Guerin's murder.
Bowden, wearing a dark suit, white shirt and patterned tie, appeared amid tight security.
He was escorted into the courtroom by six plainclothes gardai who remained within feet of him during his 11/2 hours in the witness box.
After finishing his evidence, Bowden was kept under guard at a room in the Green Street courthouse before his return to Arbour Hill Prison.
The court directed that none of the people named by Bowden in his evidence should be identified because of other proceedings.
The court was told that as a result of the investigation into Ms Guerin's murder, gardai uncovered a major drugs importation and distribution operation centred on a warehouse at an industrial estate in Dublin.
Detectives found 47kg of cannabis at the warehouse in Harold's Cross, which was valued at £470,000. They believed the warehouse was used for the distribution of huge amounts of the drug.
Bowden told Mr Eamonn Leahy SC, prosecuting, that he first got involved in cannabis distribution in or around October 1994.
He said he was in financial difficulties and approached a person he had done some work for distributing cannabis.
He then began collecting cannabis and bringing it to three lock-up garages he had rented, including a one at the Greenmount Industrial Estate in Harold's Cross.
He received phone-call orders and would make up the cannabis orders and deliver them to his "customers".
Bowden said he received payments ranging from £500 a week to £6,000 a week for the work. He said he collected the cannabis in boxes at a hotel in Co Kildare and brought them back to the lock-up at Harold's Cross where he unloaded the cannabis from the boxes. He also made lists of his regular customers and the amounts of cannabis they ordered.
Bowden identified sheets of nicknames and figures found by gardai at the Harold's Cross lockup and said they referred to his customers and the amounts of cannabis they required.
He identified references in the sheets to "The Wig" as referring to the accused man whom he first met in late 1995. He said he met "The Wig" about once or twice a week over a period of several months and said he had last met him in person in summer 1996.
He said "The Wig's" orders for cannabis varied form 10kg to 50kg but averaged around 35kg on each occasion.
Bowden pointed to the accused man, Mr Holland, and said he was the man he knew as "The Wig".
Cross-examined by Mr Brendan Grogan SC, for the defence, Bowden said he had originally told gardai after his arrest in October 1996 that he knew nothing about the murder of Veronica Guerin.
He has said he is not aware of any arrangements having been made for him when he is released from prison.
He agreed he had made 17 statements totalling 64 pages to gardai after his arrest. Bowden agreed that he had initially lied to detectives interviewing him about the Guerin murder. He also agreed that he had told gardai about the shooting of a man, and that the man had been shot because he had been telling the Provisional IRA that two named men were selling heroin.
He also told gardai that in January 1996 a submachine gun, a .357 Magnum pistol and 12 rounds of ammunition had arrived with a consignment of cannabis. The bullets were brass with silver heads and the top turned in rather than coming to a point.
Bowden arranged for the guns and ammunition to be hidden in a graveyard.
In a lock-up, he heard three named men talking about shooting Veronica Guerin and they had been told by another named man that she would be appearing in court in Kildare. He said when he prepared the gun he knew it was going to be used in the shooting.
He said another named man wanted her shot because he was upset that she had brought assault charges against him. He said he was not asked to do anything else connected with the murder and added: "I am not heavy stuff."
Bowden agreed he had seen the gun after the shooting.
He told Mr Grogan he was aware that his admissions could lead to him being charged with complicity in Ms Guerin's murder. He said he knew now that he would never be prosecuted for the murder.
Asked if he believed it was fair that he was serving six years instead of life for murder, he replied: "I had no knowledge that Veronica Guerin was going to be murdered. Shot or shot at, as had happened on a previous occasion. Intimidated, in other words. I knew that they had planned to shoot her. When I cleaned the gun I knew that that was the gun they were going to use to shoot her."
He agreed to tell the gardai about his role in the murder of Ms Guerin when he was interviewed by Det Sgt James Hanley and Det Insp John O'Mahony.
He denied he had lied to suit his own purposes. He agreed he had never personally handed over cannabis to Mr Holland but had arranged for another person to collect it for Mr Holland.
Bowden also said he had no idea how much money he had made or spent as a result of his drug-dealing but he had saved £100,000 which had since been confiscated.
He said he had bought a hairdresser's business from a friend, but after his arrest the business had closed down. When asked what he was by training, Bowden replied: "A soldier."
Further cross-examined by Mr Grogan, Bowden agreed that he knew the effects that a dum-dum bullet would have on a person and agreed they were "devastating" and would "most probably cause death".
Earlier the court ruled that Mr Holland was in lawful detention when he was held at Lucan Garda station after his arrest on April 9th this year.
A garda told the court that when she arrested Mr Holland at Dun Laoghaire, she believed he was the man who had shot dead Ms Guerin at the Naas Road on June 26th last year.
The trial continues today.