BRIAN McCracken has been asked to preside over one of the most politically sensitive investigations in the history of the State. His work in unravelling the alleged payments to politicians by Dunnes Stores in the coming months will test his mastery of complex commercial matters.
In taking on the task as chairman of the new tribunal of inquiry, the judge must run the risk of pleasing nobody. The territory which lies ahead of him is studded with political minefields in that he must conduct the work in the midst of a general election campaign with all the parties looking to him for ammunition to damage their opponents.
He has to investigate a set of payments by a complex family owned trust to an indeterminate number of politicians, their relatives, connected persons and parties, over a 10 year period. It looks like a menu from Hell's kitchen.
On the bench just two years last month, Mr Justice Brian McCracken is said to be happy when he is unknotting the tangled, complicated web often encrusting commercial and business affairs. What would boggle the mind of the average advocate inspires this man, sources say.
He is said to be more at ease with the quiet work of chancery than in the adversarial world of, say, criminal family law.
A native of Cork and now in his late 50s, Judge McCracken's general social outlook is seen as liberal. Married with children, he lives a quiet life outside Dublin. He is not, colleagues say, of a political bent but, given his experience of the beef tribunal deliberations (where he represented Dick Spring), he must know the pitfalls and problems of running, such an overtly political inquiry.
He was called to the Bar in 1957 and took silk in 1975. He oversaw a large legal practice in chancery and commercial.
His latest role as sole member of the tribunal, announced this week by the Taoiseach, has thrust him forcefully into the limelight but he is already identified with many major cases, both as barrister and judge.
Last November, he was at the centre of one of the most politically riveting libel cases in years - the action taken by Social Welfare Minister, Proinsias De Rossa, against the Sunday Independent.
The piece to which Mr De Rossa took exception was written by Eamon Dunphy in December 1992 and, the Minister claimed, contained material associating him with truly horrible activities such as subversion, armed robbery, drugs, prostitution and protection rackets.
However, eight days into the hearing, the jury of seven women and five men was discharged by the judge following lengthy submissions from counsel for Mr De Rossa and Independent Newspapers about an article on the case written the previous Sunday by Gene Kerrigan.
The judge avoided a detailed explanation, merely saying he was afraid he had to tell them there had been an unfortunate development in the case because of certain things that had occurred over the weekend.
He awarded all legal costs to Mr De Rossa and the case is set to resume later this month.
As a senior counsel he was involved in the 1980s in one of the largest alleged negligence cases ever - between £30 million and £550 million - when Allied Irish Banks and Icarom, the legal remnant of the failed Insurance Corporation of Ireland, sued auditors Ernst and Whinney. The case was settled with no admission of liability from Ernest and Whinney. Brian McCracken's brilliance in unravelling the labyrinthine maze of financial transactions is cited among colleagues today as evidence of his suitability for chairmanship of the political payments tribunal.
"It is my abiding memory of him that his cross examination of Charlie Haughey [at the beef tribunal] was a gentlemanly encounter in which the hard questions were asked without any rancour or performing to the gallery," one beef tribunal observer says.
"There was no needless rowing or showmanship though he was just as passionate an advocate as any of the others. He is an apparently mild mannered but obviously very intelligent lawyer," the same source adds.
As a judge, he heard a case which ran for 40 days in the High Court concerning ownership of the leasehold of Sachs Hotel in Dublin.
Legal sources look on his latest appointment with sympathy and envy. Mr Justice McCracken will get a rare opportunity to slice deeply through Ireland's political and commercial life but his task will undoubtedly be protracted as the trails he follows may well lead outside the country or concern payments to individuals who may be quite remote from the real payee.
As a judge, he has been good at doing cases concerning areas which were not familiar to him when he was practising as a barrister. Now he must draw on all his reserves to guide the Dunones's payments tribunal ship through what could be very turbulent waters indeed.