Anglo official took legal advice over change to minutes
■ She denies chairman told her to ‘shut up’
ANGLO Irish Bank’s company secretary took legal advice when she was told to change the minutes of a meeting that was held weeks after the bank was bailed out, a court has heard.
Natasha Mercer said she consulted a lawyer after she was told to amend references to how aware the Financial Regulator and Central Bank had been of Anglo’s €7.2bn interbank transactions with Irish Life and Permanent (ILP) during the financial crisis.
She denied, however, that the bank’s then-chairman Donal O’Connor told her to “shut up” when she challenged him three times about changing the minutes.
Ms Mercer was giving evidence in the fraud trial of Anglo’s former CEO, David Drumm.
Mr Drumm (51) is pleading not guilty to conspiring to defraud Anglo investors in 2008 by dishonestly creating the impression that the bank’s customer deposits were larger than they were.
He also denies false accounting.
Dublin Circuit Criminal Court heard that in February 2009, Donal O’Connor asked Ms Mercer to make amendments to the minutes of an audit committee meeting of November 18, 2008.
He had discussed it with two other non-executive directors, Michael Jacob and Gary McGann, who had been at the meeting.
Brendan Grehan SC, defending, said Anglo’s former chief financial officer Matt Moran had said in a statement that Ms Mercer had told him about conversations she had with Mr O’Connor.
According to Mr Moran, Ms Mercer had said she challenged Mr O’Connor three times and “he told her to shut up”.
Mr Moran said that Ms Mercer had said “at that stage, Matt, I had done my job”.
Ms Mercer told Mr Grehan that Mr O’Connor had never spoken to her like that. She did not recall discussing the issue with Mr Moran.
The legal advice was that as a matter of governance, the chairman of the committee – Gary McGann – had the final say.
Her handwritten note said auditors Ernst and Young were “brought through” and the Financial Regulator was “aware”.
The final minutes stated: “It was confirmed (the ILP transactions) were in the nature of normal year end balance management activity” and the Financial Regulator and Ernst & Young “had no issues with them”.
Ms Mercer also agreed with Mr Grehan that, contrary to the official record, there did appear to be references in her notes to the ILP transactions during meetings on September 22, 26 and 30, 2008.
The trial continues.