Omagh accused's barrister questions garda work practices

Surveillance officers who followed the movements of a terrorist boss accused of being responsible for the most lethal bomb of the North's conflict today denied putting their heads together to make statements.

A barrister for convicted terrorist Michael McKevitt also questioned the work practices of gardaí, who failed to keep any written notes or photographs of alleged meetings his client had with an FBI agent who infiltrated the group.

Kieran Vaughan QC told the landmark civil case sitting in Dublin that it was obvious officers had memorised undated statements for the hearing, which were made after McKevitt’s arrest for terrorist offences in January 2001.

The civil action is being taken by six families against five men they believe are responsible for the blast, which killed 29 people, including a woman pregnant with twins, in Omagh.

McKevitt, the alleged leader of the Real IRA, Liam Campbell, said to be his number two, Colm Murphy, Seamus McKenna and Seamus Daly all deny any involvement in the bomb attack in the Co Tyrone town on a busy Saturday afternoon in August 1998.

On day 19 of the unprecedented case – which has heard four weeks of evidence in Belfast Crown Court – members of the Garda Surveillance Unit said they witnessed McKevitt and David Rupert together at a Dundalk housing estate on February 18, 2000.

The accuracy of testimonies given by Detective Garda Fergal O’Brien and Sergeant Seamus Lynch, who maintained they each saw the men in the cul-de-sac before and after a meeting in a house, were questioned by Mr Vaughan.

They told the District Court that at no time did any officer consider video recording or photographing the meeting, did not logged times or car registration numbers, or note the clothes the suspected terror boss was wearing.

Both gardaí said it was not their job, but the responsibility of their senior officer Det Sgt Thomas Finbarr Healey who gave evidence yesterday, to record the movements around Oaklands Park on the night.

Mr Vaughan claimed that reports and subsequent statements from all three were worded and phrased the same, and had not been dated, suggesting they were written together.

He said to Det Gda O’Brien: “I put it to you that you put your heads together to make your statements.” “I have never change my evidence,” the officer replied.

The barrister also asked Sgt Lynch if he made his statement alone.

“I did,” he told the court. “At that time I was based in Co Monaghan, I wouldn’t have been in touch with my colleagues on a regular basis at that stage.”

Mr Justice Declan Morgan, who has been hearing the groundbreaking case at Belfast Crown Court, was due to rule on whether barristers will be allowed to object to evidence from almost 50 gardaí, who have been called to testify at the case.

Lawyers for the men feared that the questions, which were written by the plaintiffs, could tarnish their client’s name if they couldn’t be disputed at the District Court.

Brett Lockhart QC, for the plaintiffs, said the legal parties had agreed between them to omit a serious of questions which in relation to nine witnesses and could proceed taking factual evidence from the witnesses.

District Judge Conal Gibbons and Justice Morgan agreed that any potentially contentious or problematic questions would be highlighted back in Belfast Crown Court over the next two Fridays, when the case is not sitting in Dublin.