An auctioneer dealing with the sale of Murphy lands offered Mr James Gogarty £10,000 as a share in the commission but he refused it, the tribunal was told yesterday.
Mr Gogarty, resuming his evidence, referred to several pages of hand-written notes he had made during 1989. He said they were in his writing and were contemporaneous notes of things he had to do.
In one of the notes he referred to Mr Michael Bailey of Bovale Ltd. Mr Gogarty said there were so many things at that time. Mr Bailey would be ringing him.
Mr John Gallagher SC, for the tribunal, asked about some notes which had been crossed out. They referred to Mr Michael Bailey and said auctioneers Duffy Mangan Butler had received a bid of £2.3 million for all the lands belonging to the Murphy group.
Mr Gogarty explained that it was to do with all the Murphy lands except a site in Longford, and seemingly there was a bid for £2.3 million by Mr Bailey.
He could not say who crossed out the note. It could have been him.
Another note referred to Mr Duffy and Mr Bailey and a purchase price of £2.4 million with a deposit to the auctioneers. The note read: "Duffy, would he give me 10,000K commission?"
Mr Gogarty said the note related to the lands Duffy Mangan Butler were selling and Mr Bailey was chasing. He would have been told or heard of an offer of £2.4 million.
"Duffy did suggest that he could share the commission with me for selling the lands. I think he was pleased he was back in the running for the lands and the sale nearly ready to go through, and he said he would share the commission with me, £10,000, and I said there was no necessity for that. I didn't want that kind of thing," said Mr Gogarty.
Mr Gallagher asked if Mr Gogarty had ever had any money from Mr Duffy. Mr Gogarty replied: "Never in my life," and never in relation to this sale.
Mr Garrett Cooney SC, for JMSE, said the entry in the notes was not in the form of a statement but in the form of a question: "Duffy, would he give me 10,000K commission?"
The chairman, Mr Justice Flood, said that was a matter for him to decide.
When Mr Gallagher asked Mr Gogarty to explain why it was worded that way, the witness said that Mr Duffy offered it to him. Mr Duffy had said there was no reason why he (Gogarty) should be worried about it, that he was sharing a commission with him and he was appreciative of what he had done for him.
Mr Gogarty read out another note referring to an offer of £2.4 million.
Mr Gallagher explained that the lands were eventually sold for £2.3 million in November 1989, seven weeks afterwards.
Referring to another note, Mr Gogarty said that Mr Bailey was anxious to deal with Mr Joe Murphy senior or him, rather than the auctioneers. Mr Gogarty said he would not want to be speculating except to say there could be a certain amount of gazumping.
He continued: "At the top of the page there was mention of £2.4 million, maybe that's what Duffy was hoping to get. Now we had £2.3 million which seemed to be the final offer."