Gardaí deny showing postmortem photographs during interrogation

Gardaí who interrogated a man over a 12-hour period in 1996 denied yesterday that he was shown postmortem photographs of cattle…

Gardaí who interrogated a man over a 12-hour period in 1996 denied yesterday that he was shown postmortem photographs of cattle dealer Richie Barron.

Strabane publican Martin McCallion said he was shown the photographs when he was wrongly arrested on December 8th, 1996. At the time, he was head doorman at Frankie's nightclub, owned by the McBreartys in Raphoe. He was one of 12 people arrested in connection with the death of Mr Barron, who gardaí believed at the time was murdered. The tribunal has since found that Mr Barron was a hit-and-run victim.

Gardaí believed Frank McBrearty jnr and Mark McConnell were suspects in the murder and arrested Mr McCallion on foot of a false witness statement that he had seen the two men and let them into the pub after the time of the death.

Mr McCallion is making no complaints against any gardaí and said he thought being shown postmortem photographs was normal procedure.

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A number of the others detained have alleged they were shown postmortem photographs. At the start of the module, four gardaí - John Dooley, John White, John O'Dowd and Martin Moylan - admitted that photographs were shown to Róisín McConnell, Katrina Brolly and Mark Quinn.

Yesterday, gardaí who interviewed Mr McCallion during different sessions denied he was shown the photographs.

Mr McCallion said he was shown the photographs during his second period of interview which was conducted by Det Garda Martin Anderson and Sgt Pádraic Scanlon.

Det Garda Anderson said he would not show those photos and neither would his colleague.

Sgt Padraic Scanlon said he was not a party to photographs being shown.

He said it did not happen in his presence.

Sgt Michael Carroll, who was present at three other interviews with other gardaí, also denied photographs were shown.