Tribunal told gardaí insisted on pursuing family

The Morris Tribunal heard today that top-level gardaí probing the controversial death of cattle dealer Richie Barron in 1996 insisted on pursuing members of the McBrearty family for the crime despite stronger evidence against other suspects.

An experienced senior garda said he believed that petty thief Paul ‘Gazza’ Gallagher was involved in the apparent hit-and-run in Raphoe which later became a murder investigation.

Detective Sergeant Sylvie Henry said he investigated Gallagher’s links with the Raphoe death and later explained them to his superiors during Garda case conferences in October 1996, but they didn’t heed him.

The senior garda, who also ran the Crime Unit in Letterkenny at the time, today told the inquiry: “I was putting in my (investigation) reports and I was being listened to but they didn’t hear me.”

“They were still going the road of Frank McBrearty Jnr and (his first cousin) Mark McConnell and I felt I wasn’t listened to as much as I should have been.”