Court rules out interview evidence for IRA accused

Crucial garda interviews with a Dublin man accused of IRA membership cannot be used as evidence against him, the Special Criminal Court has determined.

The non-jury court ruled today that investigating garda failed to follow proper procedure when questioning Declan Geraghty (aged 29) as to his alleged membership of the IRA and that the interviews conducted on this basis were unlawful.

Geraghty, of Downpatrick Road, Crumlin, Dublin 12 and his co-accused Stephen O’ Shaughnessy (aged 31) of Avonbeg Gardens, Tallaght, Dublin 24, have both pleaded not guilty to membership of an unlawful organisation styling itself the IRA on September 25, 2010.

The court heard that the two men were arrested at a house on Westbourne Avenue, Clondalkin after gardaí found a submachine gun and ammunition during investigations into links between the Real IRA and Dublin criminals.

In an application to the three-judge court, counsel for Geraghty, Ms Bernard Condon SC, argued that his client was unlawfully detained at Blackrock garda station two days after his arrest and that evidence of his interviews with gardai regarding his alleged membership of the IRA was inadmissible.

Det Sgt Padraic Boyce had told Mr Paul Greene SC, for the State, that gardai suspended the questioning of Geraghty in relation to the unlawful possession of firearms on September 27, informing him he would be instead questioned as to his membership of an unlawful organisation.

Mr Condon said that interviewing gardaí were required by law to involve the member in charge at Blackrock garda station in the detention of his client for an offence other than that which he had been arrested for, but had failed to do so.

Presiding judge Mr Justice Paul Butler, sitting with Judge Alison Lindsay and Judge Flannan Brennan, said the court was satisfied that the detention of Geraghty for the purposes of questioning him on the possession of a firearm was lawful.

However, he said that there was no evidence that the member in charge had any grounds for believing that the continuing detention of Geraghty in relation to his membership of an unlawful organisation was necessary.

Mr Justice Butler said the court deemed that the relevant procedure had not been followed and that the questioning of Geraghty in relation to his alleged membership of the IRA was unlawful and inadmissible.

The trial will resume tomorrow morning in front of the three-judge court.