Morris Tribunal: The chairman of the Morris tribunal has asked a suspended garda detective why material to make "a gigantic bomb" was not taken out of circulation in Buncrana a decade ago, in accordance with Garda policy.
Mr Justice Morris asked Det Noel McMahon why material which could be used to make homemade explosive wasn't removed once gardaí became aware it was being manufactured in the flat of the detective's alleged informer.
"There's the making of a gigantic bomb in Buncrana, and yet everyone seems to ignore it," he said.
Det McMahon said if the material - ground fertiliser and icing sugar - was to be moved by those manufacturing it, his alleged informer, Letterkenny woman Ms Adrienne McGlinchey, would have contacted him.
The suspended detective, who Ms McGlinchey alleges arranged bogus arms finds in Donegal a decade ago with another garda, Supt Kevin Lennon, has concluded his first week of evidence. Both gardaí deny her charges, and Ms McGlinchey says she was never an informer.
Referring to fertiliser being ground in the McGlinchey flat, the judge observed: "Anyone could have taken it out and there would have been another Coshquin." An IRA attack on a Border checkpoint at Coshquin on the Derry/Donegal border in 1990 led to the deaths of a civilian and five British soldiers.
Det McMahon said the flat was watched by gardaí, but not all the time. He said he was not happy with this, and had expressed his feelings to his superiors.
He said Ms McGlinchey told him in late summer of 1993 that the Provisional IRA were grinding fertiliser for homemade explosive at a "crushing plant" near Quigley's Point in north Donegal.
He also said he had seen a bag of fertiliser in Ms McGlinchey's flat in 1992. Ms McGlinchey told him two known senior IRA members had access to her flat. The names made sense, he said, but the fact there was only one bag stored was strange.
"Did you believe her?" asked Mr McDermott.
"I wasn't in a position to disbelieve her," the detective replied.
He said he was sceptical that Ms McGlinchey would be given the task of grinding fertiliser in large quantities using only a coffee grinder. It was a "total impossibility" that the quantities later recovered could be produced in coffee grinders.
However, a find at Bridgend "backed it up. It was a small quantity that could be done by a coffee grinder".
Det McMahon denied he had instructed Ms McGlinchey to prepare ground fertiliser, as Ms McGlinchey alleged.
He denied storing fertiliser or other bomb-making equipment at his house, or travelling to Derry to buy coffee grinders, or giving Ms McGlinchey money to buy grinders with which to grind fertiliser for homemade explosives. He also denied assaulting Ms McGlinchey in her flat.