A SINN Fein councillor, Mr Christy Burke, has been awarded £7,500 damages by a Dublin court for distress caused by the false claims of a Special Branch detective.
The case arose out of remarks by Det Sgt Michael Hughes, who had warned Councillor Burke that an attempt was going to be made to assassinate him. In the Circuit Civil Court yesterday Mr Burke was also given his costs. The State is to pay the costs for each side, which will probably be £15,000-£20,000 each for the four-day hearing.
The court heard that Councillor Burke was approached at his Dublin home by Det Sgt Hughes, now retired. "He said: I've got bad news," Mr Burke recalled yesterday. "I let him in. He said there was going to be an assassination attempt on my life". The alleged threat was from "British intelligence" and an IRA splinter group.
"I said `What are you going to do about it?' And he said, `I've done something about it, I've told you. And if you have any information about the London bombings I'd appreciate it'."
In what was described as a "bizarre" twist to the affair, the former detective also claimed the councillor had been shot in the back and that the shooting had been covered up. Mr Burke allegedly got private medical attention and the door through which he was shot was replaced.
The court accepted this was "fantasy" on the part of Mr Hughes, who had no evidence of such a shooting. "I would, if necessary, have stripped to the waist in the judge's chambers just to prove the falsity of that allegation," Councillor Burke said.
Awarding damages to Mr Burke yesterday, the judge said he had borne in mind the fact that Del Sgt Hughes was clearly under pressure from his superiors to get information, and he had bent the rules to try to recruit Mr Burke as an informant.
"I think he was using the threat as a means of putting pressure on a person he believed to be vulnerable at the time," Judge Smyth said. "His real reason was to recruit an informant."
Yesterday Mr Burke said that the detective had come to his house and spoken of the alleged, threat at a time when he thought the councillor was vulnerable. "He believed I had been unwell and he knew I had been through a broken marriage".
Mr Burke said he was "glad to see justice done" and that the court had accepted his version of events in preference to that of Mr Hughes.
Garda Headquarters said yesterday it had no comment to make.