Morris Tribunal: It was "most unusual" that a witness in the Richie Barron investigation made a statement in the presence of three members of the Garda after he had just been questioned and admitted to theft, the chairman of the tribunal has said
Letterkenny garda Sgt Martin Moylan told the tribunal he had been present when Mr Noel McBride made a statement about the whereabouts of Mr Frank McBrearty jnr and Mr Mark McConnell, the two men gardaí identified as suspects in a murder inquiry following the death of the Raphoe cattle dealer.
"It conveys to me the impression that there was pressure being put on this young man," Mr Justice Frederick Morris said.
"It was certainly unusual yes," said Sgt Moylan. But, he said, it did not "ring alarm bells" at the time. Mr McBride retracted his statement in September 1997.
"The very notion of getting a source or informer into that situation and, so to speak, digging a statement out of them under protest. Did the whole thing not smell?" the judge asked.
"At the time I didn't cop it, my lord, to be honest," said Sgt Moylan. "It didn't occur to me. It should have." The sergeant said he had " a health issue at the time" but was not offering it as an excuse. "It just eluded me."
He told the tribunal he felt he had been "drawn into" the statement taking from Mr McBride by Garda John O'Dowd and his informer, Mr William Doherty.
"My view would be that William Doherty started it off, and John O'Dowd got involved and went along with it." he said.
Discrepancies in the statement were not queried by gardaí at the time, the tribunal heard. A fight which other witnesses reported outside Frankie's nightclub at 1 a.m. was not mentioned by Mr McBride, who said he was there at the time.
The sergeant said there was concern that Mr McBride's name would get back to Mr McBrearty snr, and he would be intimidated. As a result his statement was not followed up to verify its details.
"In hindsight I suppose it should have been done, but that was the way it was." McBrearty and McConnell's movements were "minutely examined", said tribunal barrister, Mr Peter McDermott, while the account of a prosecution witness was not examined.
Sergeant Moylan said that in January 1997 a note was made at conference to follow up on Mr McBride's statement, to see if any of the people outside DJ's chip shop had seen him.
It was reported back that in 500 statements taken about the night Mr Barron died in Raphoe, no-one had mentioned Mr McBride.
The sergeant said it became clear after Mr McBride withdrew his statement in September 1997 that he was connected to Garda John O'Dowd and his informer, Mr William Doherty.
Sgt Moylan said it was not true that he and Supt McGinley (then an inspector) had questioned Mr McBride as Garda John O'Dowd said. He had not taken much part in the interview and the inspector had only stopped by the interview room for a few minutes.
However, the sergeant said he himself had asked Mr McBride some questions about whether he was in Raphoe and where he got money he had. He also drew a sketch of the area Mr McBride was referring to, and asked him to point out where he was.
Sgt Moylan said that when he was replaced by Det Sgt John White in August 1997 he was "really really annoyed," and he tried to see Supt Lennon about it.
"The only reason I could think of was that I was going to put a paragraph in the report about phone calls from O'Dowd's house to the Peoples," he said. The Peoples are members of the extended McBrearty family.
However, the sergeant also agreed it was possible he was simply replaced by another man because the investigation was not showing results.