Charleton tribunal must transcend carefully leaked narratives

Rarely has a public inquiry begun in an atmosphere where so many people already believe they know exactly what happened.

But if the Charleton tribunal, set to begin today, is to lance the toxic boil that has become the Sgt Maurice McCabe debacle, it must start afresh.

The ugliest side of the whole controversy involves the alleged smearing of Sgt McCabe in connection with a claimed sexual assault on a young girl, whose father is a Garda colleague of Sgt McCabe.

The girl’s father was disciplined after a complaint process involving Sgt McCabe in January 2006.

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Some 11 months later, in December that year, the allegation of sexual assault was made to the Garda.

It was said to have taken place when the girl was aged six, though she was almost 14 by the time the allegation was made.

The Director of Public Prosecutions directed in 2007 there were no grounds for prosecution.

Whistleblowing

About nine months after the DPP’s decision, Sgt McCabe began whistleblowing about what he saw as shortcomings and corruption in the Cavan-Monaghan Garda division.

Some of his complaints were upheld by the O’Higgins commission which investigated them. Others were rejected.

The girl who made the complaint later became a central figure in another chapter of the controversy. She went to a counselling session in Co Cavan in 2013 and it was arising from that session that a referral was made by Tusla/HSE.

The referral correspondence contained a more serious allegation than the girl – now in her 20s – ever made against Sgt McCabe.

The health authorities have said a copy-and-paste error from an unrelated case file led to the more serious allegation being inserted into the referral correspondence. To date, acres of media analysis has strongly implied a number of theories so often they have become accepted as gospel by the public.

The tribunal, chaired by Mr Justice Peter Charleton of the Supreme Court, must now transcend this. It must judge afresh the credibility and reliability of testimony from all of those who give evidence, whether they hold high office or have no office at all.

The parameters of the controversy set down by selective leaks to selected journalists must be set aside. Everyone’s testimony must be tested with equal rigour and no voices should be excluded from the process.

Allegation

To date, the specific allegation against Garda Commissioner Nóirín O’Sullivan has never been publicly set out.

She remains under pressure to step aside until the inquiry has been completed, though she has protested her innocence and said she plans to remain at the top of the Garda.

It has been alleged she knew of and/or was possibly somehow involved in the alleged smear campaign to undermine Sgt McCabe when he turned whistleblower.

But the specifics of the allegations against her have never been ventilated.

Instead, they are contained in protected disclosures – which are not published.

What is believed to be the main disclosure was made by the former head of the Garda press office, Supt David Taylor.

He met Sgt McCabe and briefed him before making his disclosure last autumn, claiming he was instructed to send damaging messages about Sgt McCabe to other Garda members, journalists and politicians.

And it appears that, on the basis of what Supt Taylor told him, Sgt McCabe compiled his own protected disclosure and lodged it with the Department of Justice.

The commissioner has described the allegations – which, again, have yet to be revealed – as “a campaign of false accusations, repeated and multiplied” that did not make her “guilty of anything”.

The great strength of the tribunal is that the crucial detail and veracity of what is alleged, along with the credibility of the defence to date, will emerge.

And when that truth rises above the leaks, it should confirm or displace that which we think we already know.