Barr Tribunal: Mr John Carthy planned the siege at Abbeylara, which ended in him being shot dead by gardaí, because he wanted to go out with a bang, counsel for the Garda, Mr John Rogers, told the Barr tribunal yesterday.
The actions of Mr Carthy leading up to his death indicated there was, "at the very least", to be some element of pre-planning the events at Abbeylara in April 2000, Mr Rogers said.
Mr Carthy had "a very large supply of cartridges in the house out of season"; he had told Alice Farrell the night before the siege began that the party was over and that there would be "no more guards"; he had said "goodbye" to his mother and he had holed up in the house with no indication that he would give himself up.
"Some of the language used by John would indicate that he wanted to go out in a big way. He had told Kevin Ireland on the phone to 'watch this space'," Mr Rogers said.
Mr Carthy had never given any indication that he wanted to come out to have freedom, he added.
"Did it not look like John had some plan of coming out in the way he did that may well have involved him dying?"
Supt Patrick Hogan, who was the inspector in charge of the Emergency Response Unit (ERU) at the time of the siege, said those factors would have been in the mind of the negotiators. Even so, he said the negotiators would endeavour to have some sort of dialogue that would result in a peaceful resolution of the situation.
However he conceded that the ERU had been "duty bound" to shoot Mr Carthy when they did.
Judge Barr earlier intervened during the evidence of Supt Hogan to suggest that Mr Carthy may have been offering a "gesture of good will" when he removed one cartridge from his gun on leaving the house.
Judge Barr was reacting to Mr Roger's suggestion that there was a "sense of defiance and closure" in Mr Carthy's actions and that he was attempting "suicide by cop".
"Could not Mr Carthy have been demonstrating partial compliance with what was sought by Sgt Jackson in the course of negotiations, a gesture of good will that might encourage the ERU not to shoot?", added Judge Barr.
Even if Mr Carthy wasn't attempting to commit "suicide by cop", Mr Rogers said, he was engaging in such extreme recklessness that he must have expected repercussions. "He was defying such appalling odds that there must have been an element of premeditated determination."
