I wish to reiterate at the outset, for reasons I will outline, that separate representations received by me at different times from each of the parties in the Sheedy case and passed on by my office to the Department of Justice have no relevance whatsoever to the circumstances surrounding the premature release in the Circuit Court of Philip Sheedy last November. It is important that we all keep a sense of proportion, and not treat an incidental detail, that is essentially immaterial, as if it were a vital link in the chain.
Mr Philip Sheedy, it will be recalled, was sentenced to be imprisoned for four years on 20 October 1997 in the Circuit Criminal Court, having been convicted of dangerous driving causing death, while being under the excessive influence of alcohol. On foot of representations made to another member of the judiciary, a review was reinstated, and the sentence was reviewed a year later by the judge who should have sat in the case originally, but did not.
Early release was ordered by him in unusual circumstances, for reasons that have not yet been totally clarified but which have no political connection. When the release came to the notice of the family of the victim, strong representations were made, and following an official inquiry the Chief Justice was very critical of the handling of the case by two of the judges involved. Both subsequently resigned.
It was brought to my attention by my Private Secretary on 12 April that I had made an inquiry, on 9 July 1998, as to whether it would be possible for Mr Sheedy to get day release. Although I did not immediately recall at the time what way the matter had been brought up, I have now established that the inquiry was made by the father of Mr Sheedy, neither of whom I knew, seeking day release for his son for one or two days a week to attend a training course on projects of benefit to the community.
Some of the comment has blurred the distinction between "release" and "day release", which are quite separate issues. I wish to point out that "day release" has no bearing on the length of the sentence to be served but merely concerns the conditions under which the sentence is served. I want to emphasise that no representations or inquiries were made by me or my office as to whether Philip Sheedy could be released early, which was the issue in the judges' handling of the case. I should, however, state that Mr Sheedy senior enclosed with his letter proposals drawn up by an instructor in FAS to expand and modify the general programme of day release, in a way that after a certain period day release would have become equivalent to actual release on part-time community work as an alternative to prison.
When instructing my Private Secretary, I left this proposal to one side as I probably considered it a longer-term policy matter which perhaps Mr Sheedy thought could benefit his son, as well as enabling him to give something back to the community. After an extensive search I have now found the letter that Mr Sheedy senior sent to me, which, with his permission, I am now reading into the record of the House. The letter is undated, but the manuscript note given to my private secretary was dated 9/7/98. The letter reads as follows:
Mr Ahern,
My son Philip is presently serving a four-year sentence in Shelton Abbey, Arklow, Co. Wicklow, having received the sentence on a Death by Dangerous Driving charge. To date he has served 9 months.
The reason for my making this representation to you in your capacity as Taoiseach, you may be in a position to recommend Philip for the day release work programme currently operating in our prison system for the rehabilitation of prisoners. I believe through my employment with FAS and its involvement with community work groups that there is a lot of projects in which he could use his architectural skills in the community around the Arklow area on a day release, say one or two days per week. Projects where he would be involved in designing, supervising and advising on community skills or special buildings for the elderly. Prior to his accident he had been involved as a volunteer worker in designing special buildings for the elderly in Summerhill, Co Meath.
His services would benefit the Arklow community and also keep his work skills fresh and active.
I enclose a copy of a proposal programme which has been designed by Tony McAvinney "an inspiring instructor" in the FAS town centre in Tallaght. This Programme with the title Offenders Community Employment Programme is envisaged to save up to £1 million per annum on the basis of a recent newspaper report which gives a figure of the average cost of a prisoner in our prisons at £45,000. If this programme was implemented I would gladly take leave of absence from my position in FAS and work for the Dept of Justice in the setting up, co-ordination and supervision of the Pilot project. My work in the setting up of FAS work schemes in the Tallaght area over the last 19 years would make this task very simple and I would guarantee very successful.
The programme would differ from the present Community Services programme in that the offender will serve at least six months in prison and the remainder of his sentence on a particular single project as part of a team.
The reason again for writing this simple representation to you is that Philip through the day release programme currently in operation would find some gain from helping the community and paying back to society the benefit of his work skills.
If the above is not possible I will understand and I thank you for finding the time to read this request
Yours sincerely,
Philip Sheedy Senior
The implication that I took from the last paragraph was that if nothing could be done no reply was needed.
My then Private Secretary, who served my predecessor as Taoiseach as well as myself and who acted correctly in all of this, spoke by telephone to the Private Secretary to the Minister for Justice on the basis of my hand-written note, and the inquiry was confined to the possibility of day release as it operates at present. There was nothing covert about the query. The details were registered on computer.
The instruction to my Private Secretary as noted by him was: "Justice - What is the story?" I did not make a recommendation, as perhaps Mr Sheedy Senior would have liked me to have done. Nor was the inquiry, strictly speaking, made or addressed to the Minister. It has been confirmed to me that the Department of Justice treated it, as intended, as a routine inquiry. The Minister did not see it. Numerous enquiries are addressed to him all the time relating to all manner of cases, by Deputies from all sides of the House, and indeed by people, such as priests and social workers. Routine inquiries of all kinds are made all the time between respective Ministerial private offices, on behalf of Ministers or the Taoiseach.
Sometimes, as we know, people who are released early go on to commit repeat offences. But my inquiry was not a recommendation or request for early release. It was concerned only with the possibility of day release. I was not aware of any approaches the Sheedy family made to anyone else, but it is not unusual for more than one public representative often from different parties or others in positions of authority to be approached about the same matter. I was not aware of Mr Joe Burke's visit to Mr Sheedy in Shelton Abbey.
The oral reply my office subsequently received was that day release was not possible because it would be too early in the sentence and also there was a scheduled review in October 1999. In fact, there was nothing on the file that would have shown that the review date had at that time been removed. When a negative response was received from Justice, I dropped the matter and did not pursue it further.
I accepted without question the Department of Justice's view on the matter. I did not press the case in any way, even though the Minister has powers to order the early release of convicted persons. So to sum up, my office made a routine inquiry about the possibility of day release only. They received a negative response. The matter was left there. The Minister for Justice has stated that the answer to numerous requests for concessions of one kind or another from Mr Sheedy was always No, so it is nonsense to suggest that the Government showed any special sympathy to Mr Sheedy. The issue in the Sheedy case was whether judges in the light of their duties acted properly. The Chief Justice expressed a critical opinion on that. I in the performance of my duties acted with complete propriety in relation to the representations received .
I, or more accurately my office acting on my behalf, did only the minimum of what any TD does in the circumstances - pass on the inquiry, note the response, and if at any point there is a development pass it back to the inquirer. I would have done the same for any constituent, or indeed citizen, regardless of their social or political background. I applied no political pressure to get Mr Sheedy early release.
I should also mention that I received a letter from John Ryan on 15 February last, whose wife Anne was tragically killed in this particular road accident. He explained the deep sense of betrayal by the legal system, which he and his family felt at the early release of Mr Sheedy. He asked me for any assistance I could give to remedy the situation. The letter was immediately acknowledged, and I referred it on to the Minister for Justice, Equality and Law Reform, Mr John O'Donoghue TD on 16 February with a request for material for a reply.
In the event, the pace of developments made it difficult to issue any early substantive reply. My Private Secretary contacted Mr Ryan by phone on 12 April to apologise for the delay in replying to him and to explain that a reply would be given to him, as soon as the Hamilton Report was received. Following receipt of the Report, I contacted Mr Ryan by telephone on 16 April, and we discussed the conclusions reached by the Chief Justice. I also replied in writing to him on the following day.
As the House will be aware, the Government treated this entire matter involving members of the judiciary with the utmost seriousness and without fear or favour towards any of those involved. It should be overwhelmingly obvious that the Government did not seek at any stage to protect Mr Sheedy from facing the full consequences of his offence. Appeals to shorten sentences, even in the case of equally serious crimes, actually served are regularly received from Deputies, but there was no such appeal made by me.
I and my general office have a large casework, apart altogether from the conduct of Government, which has to be my principal concern. When I came back from the Easter break on 12 April, I was reminded of the fact that I had made a representation by my Private Secretary on 12 April, who in turn had been alerted by the Department of Justice who had confirmed that they had a note on their file to inform the Taoiseach of any developments in the case. My Private Secretary first heard the suggestion that there could be something on file on 1 April, when we were in Hillsborough Castle, the Thursday before Easter. Nevertheless, I informed the Tanaiste about the matter in the following couple of days, and the Cabinet by the end of the week.
As I have said, the original routine inquiry had no connection with the subsequent handling of the case in the courts. I want to state categorically, so as to allow no misunderstanding, that I made no representations direct or indirect to any member to the judiciary in relation to the case, and indeed I never asked anybody about early release. It is clear that at no stage before the handling of the case in the courts became a matter of state in February of this year did I regard the case, tragic and unfortunate though it was from everyone's point of view, as one deserving or needing any special priority from me.
It was always my intention to put the information in the public domain, as soon as I had a suitable opportunity to do so. The issue was not so much not being asked the right question, as not being able to find any obvious suitable opening in reply to supplementary questions about the DPP and State Solicitor's office, in which I could have reasonably inserted the information as I had firmly intended, and as I had discussed with the Tanaiste.
I had a note with me for the purpose. We have all been in situations where we intended or even agreed to say something, but have failed to do so, because we could not find the right opportunity. At least 15 minutes of Taoiseach's question time that day was taken up by technical argument between deputies and the Chair. However, as I acknowledged in my statement yesterday evening, I accept that I should nonetheless have found some way, however artificial, of doing what I had originally undertaken to do.
More generally the problem with an unsolicited parliamentary statement is the implication that as a procedure it is used normally when one has done something wrong or by way of correction to the record. There is an understandable and legitimate concern not to feed conspiracy theories, or by juxtaposing irrelevant information to imply or signal the probability of some hidden connection. As he has already publicly stated, the Minister for Justice did not include the information in his statement to the Dail, for precisely those reasons, because he felt it would distract attention from the main issue, to which it was not relevant, and I agreed with that judgment.
No disrespect to the House is intended by me or any of my colleagues, and I believe this Government has always tried to be open with the House in regard to providing all the information necessary to form a judgment in any controversy. I fully appreciated, nevertheless, that it was necessary to put the information on the public record and sooner rather than later. I did not get a good opening to mention the matter in the Dail as I had hoped at Question Time last week, but equally I accept that I was remiss in not finding some way of doing so.
I let the matter be widely known, and gave full information when requested to a journalist from the Sunday Tribune. But again I accept that this was not a satisfactory way of doing things. This is a minority Coalition Government, which is working extremely well in conditions that demand unprecedented openness, transparency and accountability. I answer questions and points on the Order of Business and am accessible to the media, in a way that bears favourable comparison with most of my predecessors, some of whom have been a lot more adept at limiting their public appearances, interviews and answers to questions than I have been.
My inclination is always to be helpful to those whom I encounter, and that may sometimes be a failing. I work closely with the Tanaiste, consult with her and do my best to keep her informed, and we all seek to act in concert.
However, there are continuous attempts in this House on more than one matter to undermine public trust in my political integrity, which is a separate issue. I am sorry for that, but there is no want of honest intent on my part always to try and do the right thing. I will be ready when the time comes, to put the record of an honest and conscientious Administration that did its best, personally before the people, and, no matter what slant is put on it, I do not fear their verdict either on me or my colleagues.