'Where did you learn to waterboard somebody?' — Dowdall grilled by Hutch lawyer

Hutch trial hears how Dowdall learned waterboarding from films, and that he'd fixed a plug for an IRA man on his trip north

Court artist sketch of former Sinn Féin councillor Jonathan Dowdall being cross examined by Gerry Hutch's defence barrister, Brendan Grehan SC. Picture: Elizabeth Cook/PA 

Brendan Grehan SC had been asking Jonathan Dowdall a series of questions about bomb-making and things the former Sinn Féin councillor was recorded saying on the secret tapes.

But, suddenly, Gerry Hutch’s defence counsel changed tack. “Where did you learn how to waterboard somebody?” he asked.

Mr Dowdall replied that he learned it from seeing it on TV.

“It’s a very dangerous thing to be doing unless you know what you’re about,” Mr Grehan suggested, adding that it’s something that someone would want to practice.

Jonathan Dowdall said he’d also seen it in films, he didn’t know how to do it, that he was deeply sorry for what he’d done and he had destroyed his family’s lives when this all unravelled.

He may be giving evidence against Gerry ‘The Monk’ Hutch, accused of the murder of David Byrne in the Regency Hotel in February 2016, but Mr Dowdall began facing a thorough and combative cross examination at the Special Criminal Court today.

Jonathan Dowdall is at the Special Criminal Court to give evidence but was given a thorough and combative cross examination today. File picture

It was clear Mr Grehan would be exploring many facets of Mr Dowdall’s life and his previous utterances and statements for what will likely be a very lengthy cross examination before the three-judge court.

At the start of today’s proceedings, Mr Grehan noted how his client had moved position. Indeed, having sat to the left of co-accused Paul Murphy and Jason Bonney throughout proceedings to date, Mr Hutch was now seated on their right.

“Don’t read anything into it,” Mr Grehan told the court.

Mr Dowdall finished his direct evidence this morning, with portions of the infamous tapes played again in court and prosecuting counsel Sean Gillane SC quizzing him on aspects of what Mr Dowdall and Mr Hutch said on these recordings.

When it was Mr Grehan’s turn after lunch, there was a perceptible change in Mr Dowdall. He was more forceful and combative in his answers, in response to the questioning being put to him by Hutch’s senior counsel.

Mr Hutch was sitting very much forward, resting his chin on his knuckles as he listened attentively.

Before he asked his first question, Mr Grehan set out his stall.

“You know who I am and who I represent,” he told Mr Dowdall. “Let me be very clear at the start. My position will be that you have lied to this court.” He accused Mr Dowdall of telling “two big lies” and of being a “master manipulator”.

As for Mr Grehan’s questions, “many topics were traversed”, to borrow a phrase from Mr Gillane’s opening statement. Here are just some of them:

• “Do you accept you lied on the Joe Duffy programme?”;
• “Were you involved in disorganised crime?”;
• “Since when did the IRA get into the mediation business?”;
• “So do you agree you were a Good Samaritan helping somebody out?”;
• “I’m putting it to you that you’re prepared to lie for a good reason as you see it.”

At one point, Mr Grehan pointed out photos taken of Mr Dowdall by surveillance gardaí while in Donegal on 20 February 2016. For context, this was a few weeks after the Regency shooting and it’s the State’s case that he and Mr Hutch went there to meet republicans in a bid to broker a peace deal with the Kinahans.

“What were you carrying [in the photo]?” Mr Grehan asked. Mr Dowdall — an electrician by trade — said “tools”, to which Mr Grehan replied: “What were you doing, fixing a plug or something?” 

Mr Dowdall said: “I was actually”. 

Gerry Hutch who is accused of murdering David Byrne at the Regency Hotel in Dublin in 2016. He denies the charge and his barrister today put it to Jonathan Dowdall that Dowdall was lying when he said Hutch had admitted a role in the hotel attack. File picture: Rolling News 

Mr Grehan asked “are you serious”, adding: “You travelled up to Donegal from Dublin with Gerard Hutch to meet IRA men to go into a house to fix a plug?” 

Mr Dowdall replied, “it’s the truth”, before outlining a problem with the TV socket that he was able to fix.

One thing that the former Sinn Féin councillor was absolutely clear about is that he was never involved in organised crime, didn’t know anything about bomb-making, had no idea what had been planned at the Regency, and that his account of Mr Hutch admitting his role in the Regency attack was true.

“I wasn’t involved in the murder of David Byrne,” he said. “I wasn’t involved in the Regency. I was made to look like I was involved.”

Mr Grehan put it to Mr Dowdall on several occasions that he was lying in his story that Mr Hutch had admitted a role in the Regency attack, and of his father Patrick handing a key card for a Regency Hotel room to Mr Hutch the night before.

At one point, when asked why his father wasn’t “jumping up and down” to come give evidence in support of his son, Mr Dowdall answered: “Who’d be jumping up and down to come in and go through this?”

Cross-examination of Mr Dowdall continues tomorrow, Wednesday.