A Donegal garda has told how she saw a detective inspector with a sheet of paper bearing a facsimile of the signature of Frank McBrearty jnr while the Donegal publican was held in Garda custody on a murder charge a decade ago.
Garda Tina Fowley said she could see the signature "being used as a catalyst" to prompt Mr McBrearty's cousin, Mark McConnell, to make an admission in the investigation into the hit-and-run death of cattle dealer Richie Barron, which gardaí believed was a murder. Mr McBrearty and Mr McConnell, and 10 other people, were wrongly arrested in December 1996 during the murder inquiry.
Garda Fowley said Insp McGinley entered the incident room during the afternoon of December 4th, 1996, and sat working. "I had cause to walk by Det Insp McGinley and passed behind him," she said. "As I returned from walking behind him, he drew my attention to a sheet of paper. He had a smile on his face and he referred me to a signature that was on the piece of paper. He had it held in his hand at an angle like that, drawing my attention to it, and the signature of Mr Frank McBrearty was on the piece of paper."
Garda Fowley said the sheet of paper was "a sepia yellow-tinged ruled half sheet" with Mr McBrearty's signature about 10 or 15 lines down the page. "He asked me if it was a good likeness and chuckled a short laugh. I laughed too and made no other comment, and I returned to my desk."
Shortly afterwards, Insp McGinley left the room and Sgt Brendan Roache asked her what had happened. "He made some comment about McGinley being up to his pranks or up to his jokes." Garda Fowley said that Insp McGinley had a photocopy of a Form C8, a pre-printed form used to take witness statements. She said she was satisfied that the C8 was used when Mr McBrearty made a witness statement several weeks earlier.