A Garda sergeant has been jailed for a year by the Special Criminal Court in Dublin for his part in a false passports racket.
Finbarr Hickey (42), a father of three, of St Mary's Court, Mary Street North, Dundalk, Co Louth, pleaded guilty to four charges of forging two passport application forms on March 4th, 1995, one on December 2nd, 1995, and to uttering a forged passport application form at the Passport Office, Molesworth Street, Dublin, on February 2nd, 1995.
The court was told that Sgt Hickey was commended for capturing an armed robber in Dundalk in 1984, that his father retired from the Garda with the rank of chief superintendent and that his grandfather was a founding member of the force.
Sentencing him to 12 months' imprisonment on each count, to run concurrently, Mr Justice Morris, presiding, said: "He has betrayed his position of trust as a member of the Garda Siochana and has betrayed the body which the public must and is entitled to depend upon."
Det Insp John O'Mahony told the court that Hickey signed and stamped passport application forms over 10 months at Hackballscross Garda station where he was the sergeant.
He said that Hickey had severe personal problems: his marriage had broken up and he was drinking heavily when he was approached by a former senior colleague who asked him to do him a favour.
The detective inspector said Hickey had no association with illegal or subversive organisations. He said two of the forged passport applications were in the names of living persons who had not applied for passports. The other two were in the names of children who had died in infancy.
Gardai had traced three of the four forged passport holders. One was currently before the courts. The other two were outside the jurisdiction but Garda inquiries were continuing.
Det Insp O'Mahony said that Hickey was suspended when he was arrested in September 1998 and would now lose his job.
He said Hickey had co-operated fully with the gardai and had confronted the former Garda colleague at Navan Garda station but with no result. Hickey had admitted his part in the offences and had named the former colleague. He said that Hickey had played "an integral part" in the crime but was not the main instigator.
The detective inspector said: "I am aware that at the time he was very vulnerable and would have been known to have been drinking quite a lot."
Mr Hugh Hartnett SC, for Hickey, told the court that there was "a compounding of different events" in his life which led to "a certain slackness". Hickey was hospitalised in 1993 for a serious lung complaint, his marriage broke up and he was involved in a road accident in which a young child was killed, although Hickey was exonerated from blame.
Mr Hartnett said that Hickey realised the shame he had brought on his family, himself and the Garda Siochana and he apologised profoundly to them for what he had done.
"He has destroyed his career and humiliated himself and that he will suffer for the rest of his life," he added.