Carthy's cousin criticises Garda negotiating tactics

A first cousin of Mr Carthy told the inquest he felt a plainclothes garda on duty at the siege had a bad attitude to Mr Carthy…

A first cousin of Mr Carthy told the inquest he felt a plainclothes garda on duty at the siege had a bad attitude to Mr Carthy.

Mr Tom Walsh said when he asked if cigarettes were being brought for Mr Carthy, the garda replied, "He's not getting it all his own way."

Mr Walsh said he believed the fact that gardai were in constant negotiations with Mr Carthy did not help his state of mind. "He wasn't given time to think straight." He said he had a "bad feeling" when his cousin would not respond to his two attempts to negotiate. He told gardai to "try to hit him in the legs" if they had to shoot him.

He said Mr Carthy was "stubborn - he didn't give into anything".

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Mr Walsh had travelled from Cork when notified by his sister, Ann, at 6.20 p.m. on Wednesday. At 9.15 p.m. the gardai allowed Mr Walsh up to the house to negotiate with Mr Carthy.

Mr Carthy said, "What do you care?" to Mr Walsh and criticised him for not visiting him in St Loman's. Mr Walsh was brought to the negotiating position again the next afternoon but had no success.

He rejected the evidence of ERU members that Mr Carthy had levelled his gun at him which caused him to cry, but he said the Garda negotiator had "done his best".

Mr Walsh witnessed Mr Carthy fall onto his right side after he was shot. "I couldn't believe he was out on the road. How did he get that far?" He later identified the body in the morgue.

The inquest also heard evidence from Mr Martin Shelley, who Mr Carthy called "Pepper". He, too, negotiated with Mr Carthy after he arrived at the scene with Ms Marie Carty from Galway. He said he became friendly with Mr Carthy while working with him on a building site in Eyre Square in Galway. At 2 a.m. gardai told Mr Shelley that Mr Carthy was looking for him. They would not allow Marie to negotiate. "They kept telling her to hold on and pushed her back." He said it was an "impossibility" that Ms Carthy could have been drunk.

He tried to negotiate for almost two hours but Mr Carthy would not speak to him. Asked how this made him feel, he said he had expected him to talk. "I felt a bit lonely because I'm a good friend of John's."

Minutes before Mr Carthy was shot, Supt Joe Shelley had said they were going to let Ms Carthy speak to her brother and they had told him she was there, Mr Shelley said. According to Mr Shelley, "five or six" shots were fired at Mr Carthy. He was with Ms Carthy 15 to 20 feet from where his body fell.

Mr Sean Farrell, a second cousin of Mr Carthy, was the final intermediary gardai brought to the negotiating position before Mr Carthy's death. Mr Farrell said Mr Carthy "looked up" to him but he had no success at the scene. He said he couldn't make out what Mr Carthy said to him. He said he believed Mr Carthy was not a threat. "Local police might have handled it better."