Barr Tribunal: Two of the most senior Garda officers in the State at the Abbeylara siege placed all the responsibility for what happened on the scene commander, a UK police expert told the Barr tribunal yesterday.
Assistant Commissioner Tony Hickey and Chief Supt Patrick Tansey, who were at the scene, had placed on the scene commander all the responsibilities irrespective of who had arranged for events to occur or approved them, Mr Alan Bailey, a consultant in UK police use of firearms, said.
Mr Bailey has been asked by the tribunal to give an expert report into the siege in Co Longford in which Mr John Carthy was fatally shot by Emergency Response Unit (ERU) officers in April 2000.
He said he had looked at the evidence of scene commander Supt Joe Shelly, who thought his role of responsibility was wide.
The evidence of the assistant commissioner and chief superintendent was also taken on how they saw their areas of responsibility.
"They appeared to me to place on the scene commander all the responsibilities for what happened irrespective of who had actually arranged for it to occur, approved it, actually carried it out," he said.
That system was not wrong. It was just that it placed a tremendous pressure on one individual.
It had to be appropriate that where senior officers in a disciplined organisation, such as the police service, made decisions, gave advice,
approved or encouraged other commanders to take a
particular course of action,
that they should be responsible for what they did, Mr Bailey
said.
On tactics at the siege, he said the plan was to contain and negotiate. Officers were right to consider the tactic of moving containment, which was to move with Mr Carthy if he left the house.
"In my view this plan of moving containment was not developed beyond an aspiration," he said.
When Mr Carthy actually did leave the house, a greater latitude could have been given to him if the command post and the local officers had been placed further away from the house.
"You would have
additional time to cause the individual to surrender peacefully, maybe by calling on them to put the weapon down or other options."