Brian McCracken's tribunal was widely regarded as a model of fairness and efficiency and was praised for its clarity, writes Christine Newman.
Mr Justice Brian McCracken is best known for the tribunal he chaired into payments made to politicians by Ben Dunne.
The tribunal was set up in February 1997 and Mr Justice McCracken produced his 100- page report only six months later.
He found that former taoiseach Charles Haughey had given untrue evidence under oath and a Fine Gael minister, Michael Lowry, was "knowingly assisted" by Mr Dunne in evading tax.
The McCracken tribunal was widely regarded as a model of fairness and efficiency and was praised for its clarity and for unearthing a vast amount of well-hidden evidence. The Moriarty tribunal was set up to inquire further and is still sitting.
Mr Justice McCracken, from Cork, is married with a son and daughter. He was called to the Bar in 1957 and took silk in 1975. His large legal practice dealt mainly in chancery and commercial areas.
As a senior counsel he was involved in the 1980s in one of the State's largest alleged negligence cases, for up to £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.
At the Tribunal of Inquiry into the Beef Processing Industry in the early 1990s, he represented then tánaiste and minister for foreign affairs, Dick Spring of the Labour Party, although the lawyer was said not to be of any political inclination.
In January 1995, he was appointed to the High Court by the rainbow coalition.
One of his first high-profile cases was hearing the libel action taken by Proinsias De Rossa, now an MEP, against the Sunday Independent, following an article by columnist Éamon Dunphy.
Eight days into the hearing, Mr Justice McCracken discharged the jury after an article written by Gene Kerrigan had appeared the previous Sunday. He awarded all costs to Mr De Rossa.
In the High Court, he heard many cases dealing with company law, business and examinerships, including a case which ran for 40 days concerning ownership of the leasehold of Sachs Hotel in Dublin.
He was appointed to the Supreme Court in November 2002. He was involved in high-profile cases, including the ruling that patients who were charged illegally for care in State-run homes over a 30-year period were entitled to recover money, estimated to be in the region of €500 million.
Last year, he presided in the Court of Criminal Appeal which rejected an application by Dermot Laide to prevent his retrial for the manslaughter of student Brian Murphy. Later, the case was abandoned and the retrial did not go ahead.
Mr Justice McCracken has also been chairman of the National Pensions Board and a board member of the Adelaide Hospital.