Hoax bomb threat trial hears librarian's evidence

A librarian has told a jury in the trial of a man accused of sending two hoax bomb threat emails to Heathrow Airport that he recognised a man captured on CCTV using a public computer at his library on the relevant dates as the accused.

Adam Busby (aged 61), of Santry Lodge, Ballymun, has pleaded not guilty at Dublin Circuit Criminal Court. to two counts of sending hoax messages for the purpose of causing annoyance, inconvenience or needless anxiety at Charleville Mall Public Library, North Strand on May 8 and 15, 2006.

Sergent Pat Morrisey told Mr Dominic McGinn BL, prosecuting, that there was a CCTV camera installed in the library and that it was directed towards the two computer terminals available for public use in the branch.

Librarian Mr Terry Wogan told Mr McGinn that he worked as branch manager at Charleville Mall from June 2004 to September 2007. He said members of the public could use the computers free of charge by walking into the branch to see if one was free or by pre-booking a session.

He said the use of the computers was recorded on day sheets at the branch which were returned on a monthly basis to their central department.

Mr Wogan said when a person used one of the computers their name was entered on the day sheet. He said if they had pre-booked the session their name would be already written on the sheet so a tick would be put beside their name to indicated that they had shown up and were present.

He said Mr Busby was a regular user of the library and was known to him. He said Mr Busby would attend at the library three or four times a week, before taking a break for a couple of weeks, then returning again.

He said that on May 8 and 15, 2006 Mr Busby had pre-booked a session at one of the computers and a tick beside his name on the day sheets indicated that he had turned up to use the computer. He said the day sheet indicated that Mr Busby was booked to use computer “number 2.”

When CCTV footage from the library on May 8 and 15, 2006 was shown in the court Mr Wogan said he recognised a person using the computer on the left of the screen on each day as Mr Busby.

Mr Wogan agreed with Mr Peter Finlay SC (with Mr Cormac Quinn BL), defending, during cross examination, that part of his and his assistant’s housekeeping duties each day would be booting up and shutting down the computers.

He agreed that the name “Adam” without a surname was entered on the day sheet at the relevant times.

Mr Wogan told Mr Finlay that he was “not 100% certain” which of the computers was “number 1” and which was “number 2” and that due to the camera angle it was not possible to see the labels on the computer benches.

When indicating on a still from the CCTV footage where the labels were located on the computer benches he agreed that he had referred to the computer on the right of the footage as computer “number 2.”

He agreed with Mr Finlay that the day sheet had recorded Mr Busby as booked to use computer “number 2” but on the CCTV footage the person he recognised as Mr Busby is using the computer on the left.

Mr Wogan agreed with Mr Finlay that he handed the two computer hard drives, the day sheets for May 2006 and a printout of Mr Busby’s borrowing history over to gardaí.

He told Mr Finlay that he had no recollection of meeting Mr Busby in the library on either date and agreed he had not seen him since May 2006.

He told Mr Finlay that he believed the quality of the footage was good enough for him to recognise Mr Busby.

Mr Wogan agreed with Mr McGinn, during re-examination, that on the May 15 footage there was a second person using the other computer but that on the May 8 footage only one person was using a computer.

Detective Sergeant James Butler told Mr McGinn that while investigating e-mails sent to Heathrow airport he obtained two search warrants for Charleville Library to collect evidence in connection with the e-mails.

He said he took possession of two computer hard drives on dates in May 2006 and brought them to The Garda Bureau of Fraud Investigation where they were passed to an expert in computer analysis.

The trial continues before Judge Desmond Hogan and a jury of five women and seven men.