Barr TribunalA woman who begged John Carthy to leave his house, and gave out personal information about his relationship with a former girlfriend on RTÉ's Five Seven Live programme, said she did not realise she was being interviewed by an RTÉ journalist.
Ms Mary McDowell has told the Barr tribunal that the man who interviewed her did not identify himself and did not tell her she was going to be on RTÉ or Five Seven Live.
Niall O'Flynn, an RTÉ reporter at the scene in Abbeylara and producer of Five Seven Live, denies this.
Ms McDowell said she had overheard people talking about Mr Carthy and the siege in the neighbouring town of Granard. This was probably on the night the siege began, she said. She knew and liked Mr Carthy and the following afternoon decided to go to Abbeylara.
She was sitting in her car in the village when three people approached her, one of whom, a man, asked if she knew Mr Carthy. She said she did and the man asked if she would agree to be interviewed.
"I said I would if it would help John." The interview was conducted 15 minutes later.
During the interview, which was played to the tribunal yesterday, O'Flynn asked if Mr Carthy had any problems in his life. "No, no he was always laughing and joking," Ms McDowell replied.
She went on to say that Mr Carthy had been going out with a girl from Mayo but the relationship had ended. She added: "The girl says if he packed in the drink and he packed in the smoking they'd get back together again".
O'Flynn asked if she had a message for Mr Carthy. She said: "Come out, everybody loves you. Everybody's thinking about you and worrying about you and you are a good friend and you've lots of friends. So please, John, please come out."
The interview was played on Five Seven Live that evening. Mr Carthy left his house 30 minutes later and was shot dead by gardaí.
O'Flynn and his two colleagues did not give her their names, Ms McDowell said, and did not say what organisation they were from. She said she discovered the following day, after Mr Carthy's death, that her interview had been on Five Seven Live.
Counsel for the tribunal, Mr Michael McGrath, asked Ms McDowell if she was told in advance what she might be asked. "Not really", she replied.
She said she didn't really know the purpose of the interview and had not known that Mr Carthy suffered from a mental illness.
She had not heard or read any news items about the siege before giving the interview and did not know whether Mr Carthy had access to a radio.
Counsel for the gardaí, Mr David Keane, said O'Flynn maintained that he would have told Ms McDowell his name and that he was from RTÉ.
