Developer faces legal bill of €2m from tribunal challenge

PROPERTY developer Owen O’Callaghan is facing a legal bill of more than €2 million arising from his unsuccessful challenge to the Mahon Tribunal’s further inquiring into or making any findings on allegations made against him by developer Tom Gilmartin.

Mr O’Callaghan is to appeal to the Supreme Court against the High Court’s refusal last week to prevent the Mahon Tribunal carrying out those further inquiries in its Quarryvale Two module.

Counsel for the tribunal agreed at the High Court yesterday not to proceed with those inquiries before next week when the case will be mentioned before the Supreme Court.

It is expected Mr O’Callaghan’s lawyers will seek then to further stay the inquiries pending the outcome of the appeal.

Also yesterday, Mr Justice Thomas Smyth made orders requiring Mr O’Callaghan to pay the costs of his unsuccessful action against the tribunal but placed a stay on the costs orders until October 27 next.

The High Court hearing ran for a number of weeks with legal costs expected to exceed €2m.

The costs order follows the judge’s dismissal last week on all grounds the challenge brought by Mr O’Callaghan; John Deane, a solicitor and a partner in O’Callaghan Properties; Riga Ltd, of Lavitt’s Quay, Cork and Barkhill Ltd, the company which developed the Liffey Valley shopping centre in Dublin.

Mr O’Callaghan had claimed Mr Gilmartin has made “entirely untrue” allegations in private to the tribunal, including claims that Mr O’Callaghan had made offshore payments to senior politicians.

He claimed that those allegations were never mentioned in evidence by Mr Gilmartin at the tribunal’s public sessions and were concealed by the tribunal.

He claimed the tribunal was biased in relation to its treatment of Mr Gilmartin’s evidence in the Quarryvale One module.

Mr Justice Smyth rejected all of those claims. He noted the applicants contended Mr Gilmartin had on many previous occasions made statements which were “glaringly and significantly inconsistent” with statements given by him in evidence.

Even if that was correct, it was the prerogative of cross-examining counsel to exploit any such inconsistency, he said.

The applicants also contended Mr Gilmartin had made false allegations against them, the judge said. If that was correct, their counsel now had the opportunity to satisfy the tribunal of such.

He was satisfied, following court decisions requiring the tribunal to disclose certain documents to Mr O’Callaghan and to adhere to certain procedures, that the tribunal had adapted its policies and was anxious that Mr O’Callaghan and other parties be given the opportunity for a full and effective cross-examination of Mr Gilmartin.

While most of the public hearings connected with the Quarryvale One module may be complete, it was clearly the tribunal’s intention to resume hearings to complete outstanding issues, he said.

It would be premature for the court to inhibit the tribunal from discharging its task to hear the evidence.