‘All Joanne has ever looked for is confirmation she was not the mother of the baby, and an apology’

AFTER 34 years, An Garda Síochána has finally apologised for “the awful stress and pain” Joanne Hayes was put through during the Kerry Babies investigation.

The apology is long overdue and should bring some peace and healing to Ms Hayes and her family.

It also raises the question as to whether they should be compensated for what was a terrible miscarriage of justice. Although they did not end up being jailed, they have been forced to live with the fallout from a horribly bungled Garda inquiry for over three decades.

Compensation is not something Ms Hayes has sought at any stage and it is understood the topic has never been raised in discussions between her solicitor and representatives of the State.

“This has never been about money. All Joanne has ever looked for is confirmation she was not the mother of the Cahersiveen baby, and an apology,” said a source with knowledge of those discussions.

DNA testing has finally brought about the confirmation and apology Ms Hayes was looking for, but no one would begrudge her or her family if they were also to receive a hefty settlement.

Her solicitor Pat Mann was not commenting on her reaction to the apology last night and asked that people would respect her privacy.

Even if Ms Hayes did want to sue the State she could be faced with an uphill task.

The statute of limitations providing for various time limits - within which a litigant like Ms Hayes would have to initiate proceedings - depends on the cause of action she could seek to pursue. Legal sources observe that it may be possible to argue that she only became aware that she had a cause of action following the garda apology yesterday.

Then if she did succeed in bringing a case, and the State contested her claim, she would have to prove the

damage suffered, something which would likely involve medical evidence and the publicity of a high profile case. Ms Hayes is known to be extremely private.

But to this day, there has been no adequate official explanation as to how a confession to the murder of the Cahersiveen baby was extracted from Ms Hayes, and confessions of helping to dispose of the body were obtained from family members. The Hayes family alleged they were coerced by gardaí into making false admissions, but the allegation was strenuously denied by officers involved.

Not only was Ms Hayes charged with a murder she did not commit, gardaí persisted with the case in the face of compelling evidence.

First of all, the body of the baby which was born to Ms Hayes was found. Secondly, tests revealed the Cahersiveen baby had a different blood type to both Ms Hayes and the man she had been seeing.

Some gardaí persisted with the bizarre theory that she had given birth to twins by different fathers, but the DPP dropped the charges.

The garda apology did not specifically address the allegation that confessions were coerced, but it did admit that the investigation “fell well short of the required standards”. It also said the Kerry Babies Tribunal “rightly criticised many aspects of the investigation” and that the force was apologising for failings cited by tribunal chair Mr Justice Kevin Lynch.

However, it is worth remembering that the tribunal findings in 1985 were widely seen as a whitewash and only compounded the injustice felt by the Hayes family.

While the investigation was found to be “slipshod” and searches of the Hayes family farm were described as “deplorably inadequate”, gardaí were exonerated of allegations of assault and coercion made by members of the Hayes family.

Further still, Mr Justice Lynch found Ms Hayes killed her child by choking it to stop it crying, despite the fact State pathologist Dr John Harbison was unable to determine the cause of the baby’s death.

We now know from State Papers that the Garda Commissioner at the time, Lawrence Wren, took a more critical view of the investigation after receiving an internal garda report.