Garda intelligence did not receive any information which could have prevented the 1998 Omagh bombing in which 29 people died, a senior Garda officer told a Letterkenny Circuit court.
Assistant Commissioner Dermot Jennings told the trial of Det Sgt John White that he had read press reports earlier this week in which defence counsel for Det Sgt White argued that information he submitted to Garda headquarters had the potential to prevent the attack.
The sergeant, who at the time was attached to Letterkenny Garda station, is accused of planting a sawn-off shotgun near a Traveller encampment in north Donegal eight years ago.
Mr Jennings said that at the time, he was the detective chief superintendent in charge of the security and intelligence section at Garda HQ, and also headed the National Surveillance Unit.
He said it was "totally untrue" that the Garda had information about a dissident republican attack "and that if that information did come into my office or into the section I was in, it would have been passed to the RUC, as it was then. No such information was received by me. No such information ever came in from the accused that would have indicated to the Garda Síochána or anyone else that a bomb was to be planted in Omagh."
The assistant commissioner said that three days after the Omagh bombing, he received a "confidential report" in Det Sgt White's handwriting.
"There was nothing in that report which would indicate that a bomb would be placed in Omagh on August 15th," Mr Jennings said. "The report was from Det Sgt White in his own handwriting."
Mr Jennings also said that he had not passed any information to Det Sgt White regarding a group of Travellers in Donegal, or information to suggest possession of a firearm.
John Whelan SC, defending, said that the confidential report mentioned by Mr Jennings was in Det Sgt White's home and he would seek instructions overnight before beginning his cross-examination of the assistant commissioner.
Retired Det Supt Hugh Coll told the trial that he and Assistant Commissioner Kevin Carty met the Director of Public Prosecutions on June 20th, 2001, while Det Sgt White was being held under section 30 of the Offences Against the State Act.
He said the DPP directed that charges should be brought against Det Sgt White and said he was granting immunity to the chief prosecution witness, Det Garda Thomas Kilcoyne.
"Det Garda Kilcoyne was the first member to come forward, that had the courage to tell the truth," said Mr Coll, a senior member of the Carty team. He said the decision to grant him immunity would encourage other gardaí to come forward.