THE HIGH Court has halted a challenge by former assistant Dublin city and county manager George Redmond aimed at quashing corruption findings made by the planning tribunal against him.
Mr Redmond (88) may, however, challenge the tribunal’s refusal of his legal costs of being represented before it, Mr Justice Paul Gilligan said. He was giving judgment on the tribunal’s application to halt Mr Redmond’s civil action against the tribunal on grounds of delay.
The judge agreed with the tribunal that the six-year delay involved in advancing the case had prejudiced its right to a fair trial related to the corruption findings aspect and struck out that part of the claim. The case could proceed in relation to the challenge to the refusal of legal costs, he said.
The case arose after the tribunal found in its 2004 third interim report that Mr Redmond had received a corrupt payment in relation to planning matters and had also obstructed its work.
Separately, Mr Redmond was convicted of corruption in 2003 and sentenced to 12 months’ imprisonment following a majority jury verdict. That conviction was overturned on appeal as unsafe and he was released after six months.
He was retried in 2008 on two separate corruption charges but the jury failed to reach a verdict on the first count and he was acquitted on the second.
In 2005, Mr Redmond initiated his High Court action seeking to quash the tribunal findings against him. He claimed his constitutional rights had been breached, sought damages and challenged a costs order against him by the tribunal.
Mr Redmond had claimed the delay in prosecuting the case was excusable because of concealment by the tribunal of documents that would have enabled him to test the credibility of its main witness, the late James Gogarty.
He also argued he was awaiting the outcome of a Supreme Court decision in relation to an action by another tribunal party, Joseph Murphy Structural Engineering (JMSE). That April 2010 decision, he said, had a bearing on his civil case because it was critical of the tribunal’s failure to provide documents in advance to JMSE witnesses at the tribunal.
In applying to dismiss his civil case, the tribunal argued it was prejudiced by the delay of more than six years. It also argued the case was brought outside time limits prescribed by court rules and that Mr Redmond had “parked” his proceedings in anticipation of the JMSE Supreme Court decision, which he was not entitled to do. It also argued that Mr Justice Feargus Flood, the previous chairman of the tribunal, had long since retired and if Mr Redmond’s action was allowed to proceed, there were serious reputational implications involved.
Mr Redmond argued it was in the public interest he should not be allowed to suffer a wrong by the holding back of documents. The State had conceded before the Supreme Court that was a wrong, and the court had described the material as “explosive”. He said the material at issue contained serious allegations that would have been a “goldmine for cross-examination” of Mr Gogarty.
Mr Justice Gilligan said it was a situation of serious concern that parts of Mr Gogarty’s evidence to the tribunal were blacked out, suppressed and only divulged to Mr Redmond a short time before the JMSE Supreme Court case.
However, almost 12 years had passed since the conclusion of public hearings involving Mr Gogarty and eight years since the publication of the tribunal report containing the findings against Mr Redmond, the judge said.
Having done “effectively nothing” over more than six years and having only recently prepared a statement of claim, the time lapse in bringing this case was “simply too great”. The tribunal, however, had failed to show it would be prejudiced by allowing the costs aspect of Mr Redmond’s case to proceed.