The police force in Northern Ireland is convulsed by the furore over the investigation of the Omagh bombings of August 15th, 1998. The police force in the Republic is basking in self-satisfaction over the first conviction in relation to the bombing. The self-satisfaction may be misplaced. There are grounds for believing that the conviction of Colm Murphy on a charge of conspiracy to cause the Omagh bombing could be challenged on appeal, writes Vincent Browne
In its judgment in the case, the Special Criminal Court said: "It is conceded by the prosecution that its case against the accused depends upon the alleged admissions made by him in the course of Garda interrogation after arrest, which, it is submitted, are corroborated in a number of relevant areas." In other words, if the "admissions" weren't believed, there was no case.
Murphy allegedly made admissions to two teams of detectives and it was found that one of these teams had fabricated their notes of their interview with Murphy and had lied under oath in the course of the trial.
What happened was this: two of the gardaí who interrogated Murphy wrote up their notes of an interview with Murphy and inserted in their notes alleged statements made by Murphy concerning a family relationship between him and another suspect in the case. Having written up these notes they lodged them with the custody officer of the station in Monaghan where the interview took place.
They realised subsequently that Murphy had no family relationship with the other suspect, that it would be entirely implausible for them to contend that Murphy had made such an assertion during their interview with him. They therefore retrieved the interview notes, rewrote the page containing this claim and placed the notes back with the custody officer.
They went on to give perjured evidence about this. They were caught when an expert witness established "beyond doubt" (according to the judgment) that falsification had taken place. One might have thought when the gardaí are caught falsifying evidence in a case and then lying under oath about it, that would be the end of the case.
How could you believe any Garda evidence in the case when one team of detectives were caught making up evidence? However, the Special Criminal Court did believe this other evidence and it did so on the basis that there was nothing to suggest that the misconduct of one team of gardaí was known to any other gardaí involved in the case and therefore, the misconduct of one team did not contaminate the evidence of another team.
I am not suggesting that because one team of gardaí engaged in the falsification of evidence and co-ordinated perjury that it is likely that another team of gardaí did the same.
Aside from the issue of falsified and perjured evidence by one team of gardaí, questions arose about other admissions allegedly made by Colm Murphy - the admissions relied upon by the court to convict him.
A GARDA at Monaghan Garda station said that immediately after the supposedly second breakthrough interrogation by the other team of gardaí (the interrogation during which Murphy allegedly made the admissions) a garda from that second interrogation team said to him that nothing new had emerged. This was disputed by the member of that second team.
The court held that the evidence of the garda from that second team was more credible, especially as the garda to who the remark allegedly had been made was one of the gardaí who had given false evidence about the first admissions. Certainly you could see the evidence of the garda from the second team was more likely to be true, but beyond reasonable doubt?
There was another matter also which concerned a reference in the interview notes by this second team of gardaí to mobile phone calls being traced through cell masts. The evidence was that the information about calls being traced through these cells masts was not faxed to the interrogating gardaí until well after the interview with Murphy had concluded.
This raised the suspicion that the second team of gardaí also fabricated their notes - in saying that this raised the suspicion I am not saying that these gardaí did fabricate their notes or otherwise acted improperly - I am simply raising this evidential point. The court believed however that the information concerning the phone masts had been conveyed verbally by telephone to the interrogating gardaí before the crucial interview with Murphy.
But, as this information appears to have been of some technical complexity, is it not likely that it would have been communicated by fax in the first instance or at least contemporaneous with the communication of the information by telephone?
Is it reasonable to accept that the second team of gardaí behaved impeccably, given the questions that arose, especially in the context of the first team having fabricated evidence?
Is it likely that a jury, presented with evidence of one team of gardaí fabricating evidence and perjuring themselves and evidence that raised doubts about the evidence of a second team of gardaí would conclude beyond reasonable doubt that the accused was guilty?
I assume, incidentally, that readers will take it for granted that I share the general outrage over the Omagh bombing and that I am not contending here that Colm Murphy is innocent. That I don't know. I also assume that readers will appreciate I am making no suggestion that the judges of the Special Criminal Court behaved other than properly. I am merely contending that there may be grounds for Murphy appealing his conviction.