The Minister for Justice, Equality and Law Reform, Mr John O'Donoghue, and the Government, are to be commended on their action in the case of Mr William Geary, the former senior Garda officer who has now been cleared of suspicion over the events which surrounded his dismissal in 1928. Mr Geary, who is in his 101st year and who has been living in the United States since his dismissal, has consistently protested his innocence and had been campaigning over the years for the release of the relevant files from State archives.
Yesterday the Minister announced that the former superintendent's pension rights are being restored as if he had completed full service in his rank. In addition, he is to receive a payment of £50,000 ex gratia from the State. The Minister also declared that in his view the procedures which led to the dismissal in 1928 were not satisfactory and that if they were followed today would not be "regarded as being in conformity with the requirements of natural justice as currently understood". The Government considers it reasonable, the Minister said, that Mr Geary's good name and reputation should be restored and that this should be given recognition in a practical way.
William Geary was never convicted in a court or in any tribunal of inquiry. When he came under suspicion in 1928 of taking a bribe from the IRA in Co Clare he was effectively placed under house arrest at the Officers' Mess in the Phoenix Park Depot. His request for legal representation was refused and he was summarily dismissed by order of the Executive Council. The question of a pardon, as such, does not therefore arise, the Minister explained. Mr Geary, his family and his advisers in the United States, will undoubtedly recognise that the Government has responded as generously and imaginatively as it can, short of allowing the matter to go to law.
It is heartening, in an era when so many injustices appear to go unchecked and without remedy, that an elderly man, far away and in the closing years of his life, can have an adjudication such as this. It is greatly to the credit of the Taoiseach, the Minister and the Attorney General, Mr David Byrne, SC, each of whom took an active and personal interest in the case, that it has thus been resolved. Earlier attempts by Mr Geary to secure a favourable response from other administrations came to nothing.
It is, above all else, eloquent testimony to the resolve, strength of character and determination of William Geary that he has seen this issue through to a successful conclusion over a period of more than 70 years. In spite of adversity, he succeeded in building a new life for himself in the United States and began the campaign to rehabilitate his reputation. The outcome is a victory for those unrelenting efforts. And the State gains in its reputation for fair play and humanity.