MORRIS TRIBUNAL: A retired chief superintendent has denied taking a Pontius Pilate approach and "washing his hands" over the handling of alleged informer Ms Adrienne McGlinchey in Buncrana, Co Donegal, in the early 1990s.
The tribunal is looking into claims that Ms McGlinchey, together with Supt Kevin Lennon and Det Garda Noel McMahon, prepared explosives for use in bogus Garda arms finds. They have denied those claims, and Ms McGlinchey has insisted she never had an informer's role.
Mr Seán Ginty, giving evidence for the third day yesterday, told the tribunal that he relied on the reports of others. "I wasn't there so I wasn't in a position to judge myself," he said.
"It's kind of a Pontius Pilate approach, you wash your hands of everything, you didn't know anything," said Mr Paul Murray, for Ms McGlinchey. "I'm not saying I didn't know anything, I knew quite a lot," said Mr Ginty.
He denied allowing a "charade" to take place after Ms McGlinchey was arrested in March 1994. However, he said the "special circumstances" of Ms McGlinchey, who was providing what he believed was genuine information, meant she would be "let off the hook" for minor infractions.
"In that context, I would have allowed certain things to have happened, such as a sham interrogation of her," said Mr Ginty.
"Under your watch as superintendent you were quite happy to allow sham interrogations to take place?" Mr Murray asked. "I have said what I have said about it," Mr Ginty said.
A find of ground fertiliser and icing sugar in the flat of an alleged Garda informer was not regarded as the most serious of matters, Mr Ginty told the tribunal.
Mr Ginty, who retired in 1998, was questioned about a telex message sent to Garda HQ following a search of Ms McGlinchey's flat on March 14th, 1994. He said he was not aware at the time that Ms McGlinchey and her flatmate Ms Yvonne Devine were arrested the same night. "I had very sparse information on that whole incident," he said.
He said he had suggested a checkpoint be set up at Burnfoot, near the Donegal border at Derry, to intercept materials Ms McGlinchey was transporting without exposing her role as an informer. He said he did not believe the IRA took her seriously, as "they would have been aware of her behaviour in the Buncrana area".