Former Fianna Fáil TD Mr Liam Lawlor will find out at noon today if he is to be referred to the High Court for not complying with the Mahon Tribunal, reports Alison Healy.
If he is referred, Mr Lawlor faces the possibility of being jailed for the fourth time in less than three years.
Yesterday, the tribunal chairman, Judge Alan Mahon, said he had been considering the compliance issue since July 8th, and he asked Mr Lawlor to be present at noon today to hear his decision.
He also asked Mr Lawlor to return at 2 p.m. today to help the tribunal with its investigations into the rezoning of lands at Carrickmines in south Dublin.
Mr Lawlor received his first prison sentence in January 2001 when he was jailed for seven days and fined £10,000 (€12,700) for non-compliance with the tribunal.
The following July, he was jailed for seven days and fined £5,000 (€6,350). He appealed this to the Supreme Court, but the decision was upheld in December and he was jailed in January 2002.
The following month, Mr Lawlor received a one-month prison sentence and a €12,700 fine for his continued failure to provide the tribunal with financial records and documents.
Mr Lawlor returned to the witness box at the Mahon Tribunal last Friday to answer questions about transactions between companies connected to him.
Yesterday, he denied that he pursued a demand for a £2 million "finder's fee" from the Ballymore Group for his involvement in the purchase of a £4 million building in Prague in 2000.
Mr Lawlor told the Mahon tribunal the payment of the money hinged on the commercial advancement of the Hybernska project. Because it had not progressed as expected, he had not sought the payment.
He was repeatedly questioned by counsel for the tribunal, Mr Des O'Neill, about the size of his proposed fee given that the building just cost £4 million.
Mr Lawlor said the tribunal was "totally underestimating" his role in the transaction. The deal would have been lost were it not for his intervention, he said. He led the negotiations and attended several meetings to broker the deal.
Mr Lawlor also pointed out that the value of the building had greatly increased since, and this put the finder's fee into perspective. He said he was recently approached by somebody in Prague who wished to pay £6 million for the property.
Asked if he had pursued the payment of the £2 million sum since, he said he had never "raised, requested or looked for" a finder's fee from the property developers since the transaction was concluded in early 2000.
However, Mr O'Neill pointed to a fax sent by Mr Lawlor to Mr Brian Fagan, group director of Ballymore, on March 10th, 2000. The fax pointed out that the finder's fee was £2 million, on top of the £4 million cost of the property.
Mr Lawlor said this fax did not mean that he had looked for the money. "Nowhere do I specify here, this fee is due by date X," he said.
The tribunal chairman, Mr Justice Mahon, asked Mr Lawlor if he believed the money was still due to him. "It could be due if things progressed," Mr Lawlor said. If he felt he had an entitlement to the money, he would "vigorously pursue it".
The tribunal also saw correspondence from the Ballymore Group which said the details as set out in the fax were "not in accordance" with the instructions from the group's managing director, Mr Seán Mulryan.
The letter pointed out that the finder's fee would bring the cost of the building to £6 million and it sought a meeting with Mr Lawlor in London to discuss the issue.
The tribunal later heard that Mr Lawlor had received more than £200,000 in connection with the Hybernska deal.
The money was the surplus in an account which had been used to pay for the Hybernska property.