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Updated: 21.50
THE GARDA SÍOCHÁNA Ombudsman Commission has confirmed that an investigation has been unable to confirm if one of its staff members leaked information about potential bugging of its offices to the media.
The Commission has released excerpts from a investigative report compiled by Mark Connaughton SC relating to a Sunday Times article – published on 9 February – that alleged GSOC HQ was under surveillance.
In September 2013 a security sweep of the building was carried out by UK firm Verrimus, which then gave its report to GSOC.
Connaughton said he is satisfied “on the balance of probabilities that the journalist did not have a copy of the confidential report”.
The report also states that GSOC employees cooperated with Connaughton, but the journalist in question chose not to do so.
The document notes that a number of GSOC’s staff had been in contact with the journalist, stating:
Mr Connaughton focussed particularly on contacts with the ST Journalist in the weeks proceeding the article… Not all of these contacts related to the sweep/investigation…[GSOC staff] denied emphatically giving any information of or concerning the security sweep/investigation to the journalist.Mr Connaughton concluded: ‘There is no reason to doubt their statement.”
Connaughton said it was possible the journalist had a number of sources, some of whom could have been external.
In June, the Cooke Report found no evidence to support any claims that GSOC was under surveillance.
Last week former Justice Minister Alan Shatter, who resigned following the publication of the Cooke Report, called for GSOC Chairman Simon O’Brien and his fellow Commissioners to step down.
Originally published: 20.55
He insisted their positions were untenable in the wake of the bugging controversy and subsequent investigations.
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If GSOC can’t keep oversight of seven of its own members how can we trust it to do so for over 10,000 guards? Lets admit it, GSOC is not fit for purpose.
David,
This GSOC affair has resulted in ridding us of a pretty odious Minister for Justice, a man who chose to resign when a finger was pointed in his direction. It now appears as though that resignation may have been ehhh… “unjustified”….
The number of complaints made against Gardai turned out to be “higher than expected” – so I would beg to disagree.
Garda management has been shown not to be fit for purpose, and in giving GSOC more teeth, we can only hope to see vast improvements across the board.
Accountability is essential – as of course is fairness in procedures. Would you like to see a return to Callinan style management?
What I would like to see is a credible independent policing oversight group set up, one without several former gardai in its ranks, with a compentant leader, enough manpower with the right skill set to conduct investigations in house (currently all but the most minor cases are still investigated by the gardai themselves, and GSOC lack an one with experance or training in forensic accounting) and which has powers to investigate any member of AGS regardless of rank, and to receive information from AGS without interference from the minister of justice.
GSOC is quite clearly not that group, in fact one international observers comment on the quality of GSOC’s own investigations into complains against members of AGS is that GSOC is either majorly imcompetant or willfully obstructive.
Some complainants have even made the very serious allegation that members of GSOC have destroyed evidence, which begs the question who is GSOC accountable to, because it seems to be the whim of the minister of justice, who may have reason to tollerate an ineffective oversight group.
GSOC is a joke with a joker leading it
“a number of GSOC staff had contact with the journalist”. Not of it self worthy of investigation?
Did anyone think to ask Leo Varadkar??????……
That man thinks he knows everything……
It’s that most Irish of Irish again……Mister Nobody. Responsible for untold crimes and misdemeanours!
I could have saved them the money and wrote the report on the back of a fag box! It would take a very stupid staff member to admit to it, the newspapers were going to protect their source, in short the chance of finding the culprit is practically zero!
Right so, move on everyone, absolutely nothing to see here…..again
The photo it very misleading, surely it should be of the GSOC office not the Garda office
At first it looked like a typo: “The findings of the investigative report, complied by Mark Connaughton SC, were inconclusive.”
But then it seemed as if might be more than that: “The Commission has released excerpts from a investigative report complied by Mark Connaughton SC relating to a Sunday Times article…”
I’d say this should be COMPILED!?
have your say