Top garda detective faces gun possession trial

A Garda Detective Sergeant who helped foil a string of Real IRA terror attacks in the mid-1990s is to stand trial tomorrow for illegal possession of a gun.

John White, a key player in the long-running Morris Tribunal, is accused of planting a shotgun at a traveller site outside Burnfoot on the Inishowen peninsula.

The 51-year-old suspended officer is due to appear before Donegal Circuit Court in Letterkenny.

The trial is expected to last three weeks and if it goes the full distance will be the longest criminal case ever heard in the county featuring over 70 witnesses.

The charge relates to a search of the traveller camp in May 1998 after rumours circulated that a weapon used in a post office robbery was being hidden at the site. The tip-off was said to have come from a garda informer.

Four search warrants were secured and a team of officers raided the encampment and allegedly uncovered a double-barrelled sawn-off shotgun and ammunition in a shed. Seven people were arrested following the operation.

At the time of the search, Sgt White, who has been suspended from active duty for the last five years, was based in Raphoe and was helping to run the investigation into the mysterious death of cattle-dealer Richie Barron in 1996.

His role in that has been probed by the Morris Tribunal and the Burnfoot incident was also examined during weeks of private hearings at the inquiry.

The three most recent reports compiled by Mr Justice Frederick Morris, one of which concerns Burnfoot, have not been published over fears that it may prejudice Sgt White’s trial.

Sgt White earned enormous respect from colleagues in anti-terror units in An Garda Siochana in the mid-1990s over his handling of an important informer with links to dissident republicans and the Real IRA.

He was credited with passing on information that helped thwart a series of bomb attacks in Northern Ireland.

But he has also claimed his informer tipped him off that the Real IRA were planning a bombing weeks before the market town of Omagh was devastated in the single worst terror atrocity to hit the north.

The no-warning blast killed 29 people including a woman pregnant with twins.

Sgt White said he passed on details about a car which was to be used in the attack to a senior Garda officer but it was not conveyed to the Royal Ulster Constabulary.

Northern Ireland Police Ombudsman Nuala O’Loan has investigated the claim, passing her findings on to former Foreign Minister Brian Cowen.

The Government appointed a team to investigate his allegations which was headed by retired civil servant Dermot Nally.

In December 2003, Justice Minister Michael McDowell told the Dail that the Nally Report had found no evidence to support any of the claims, but it has never been published.