Madam, - The recent Donegal Garda scandal is one of the darkest episodes in the recent history of modern Ireland. Nobody outside the McBrearty family can imagine the anguish and distress suffered by an innocent family at the hands of a number of corrupt gardaí.
However, at the recent MacGill Summer School, Frank McBrearty, Senior, and Frank McBrearty Junior launched a verbal tirade against the Minister for Justice and the Morris Tribunal, which was both misleading and unfair.
By refusing to co-operate with the Morris Tribunal, the McBreartys are ensuring that the true scale of this injustice may never be revealed and the guilty parties may never be punished accordingly.
The principal demand of the McBreartys is for their legal costs to be guaranteed in advance. However, if the Minister for Justice acceded to the McBrearty's demands, he would then be legally compelled to guarantee the full legal costs of the named gardaí, even if those gardaí lied to and obstructed the tribunal. The Morris Tribunal would then surely descend into a farce.
Can you imagine the public outcry if corrupt gardaí lied to and obstructed the tribunal and then sent the bill to the taxpayer?
Michael McDowell has assured the McBreartys that their legal costs will be settled promptly and efficiently when they co-operate with the tribunal, as naturally would be expected. Frank Senior and Frank Junior have nothing to lose and everything to gain by co-operating with Justice Morris. Decency, self interest and common sense requires the McBreartys to expose their tormentors to the full scrutiny of Justice Morris.
What happened to the McBreartys was disgusting and wrong. But the behaviour of the McBreartys towards the tribunal and the Minister is also wrong. And two wrongs can never make a right. - Yours, etc,
B. GEOGHEGAN,
Temple Manor Grove,
Dublin 12.