Families visit jailed Anglo bank trio in show of support
Sleepless night as John Bowe, Willie McAteer, and Denis Casey begin sentences in Mountjoy
SHORTLY before 10am yesterday, the families of John Bowe (52), Willie McAteer (65), and the former group chief executive of Irish Life and Permanent, Denis Casey (56) arrived a half an hour early to Mountjoy prison’s training unit, eager to see the husbands and fathers.
Huddled in a group outside the garish blue gates, they chatted for a while about how they were feeling. One visitor was overheard saying she had great difficultly sleeping the night before.
The families looked exhausted, but keen to get inside.
Although refusing to talk to the media, they were extremely polite to journalists — and one woman carried a newspaper inside for her husband.
The men had spent their first few hours on Friday evening getting accustomed to their new surroundings — after Judge Martin Nolan ruled all three must pay for conspiring in a €7.2bn scheme to artificially boost Anglo’s accounts.
On arrival, they were met by medical staff and the prison’s psychiatric services and told the services were there if they needed.
They were also told that a chaplain was on hand in the event that any of the men needed to talk.
They are allowed three changes of clothes — one to wear, one spare and one for laundry — and access to the library and education courses.
This morning their cells were unlocked at 8.15am so they could collect a breakfast of cornflakes or toast before returning to their cells to eat.
The basic unit contains a television and a kettle for making tea.
For 16 hours a day the men will be locked in their cells. Any additional time they choose to stay after that is optional.
A prison source told the Sunday Independent: “They have the choice to stay in their cells if they want to get used to their new environment for a few days but they will be strongly encouraged to come out and mix with other prisoners.
He continued: “They would have been asked on Friday evening if they know anyone inside or if they have any reason to believe their life could be under threat.
“The prison would also rely on information on the ground, coming back from prison staff who have spoken to prisoners to see what the general feeling is towards them. If everything is okay they will be put on a normal wing with everyone else. There is no guarantee the three men will be together on the same wing, it is all down to cell availability.”
As their sentences were handed down last Friday, one onlooker described the scene:
“It was extraordinary in a sense that there was complete silence. One young girl shed a quiet tear and they all walked out together.”
Denis Casey came with a hold-all bag and sat separately to Willie McAteer and John Bowe, who sat together on a bench.
The back of the court was packed with media and onlookers.
The same source told the Sunday Independent: “The judge spoke for a half an hour and it was torturous because you didn’t know what he would do in the end.”
The characters of each man were described in court.
Former Anglo Bank executive McAteer, is self-made and worked on buses and building sites in England to get money together to put himself though a chartered accountancy course in college.
Former Anglo Bank executive Bowe had been working with drug addicts in the Merchants Quay project for the past year.
Casey started at the very bottom rank, as an insurance clerk, and worked his way up to group chief executive of Irish Life and Permanent.
Judge Nolan, a former garda, found all three guilty of criminal conspiracy in the longest trial in the history of the State.
He said that “following orders” was no defence in the eyes of the law.
However, he pointed out that the three men did not benefit financially from the transaction.
He also stated that certain State authorities turned a blind eye to “optically driven balance sheet management”, which he said was a euphemism for banks entering into transactions which have little or no effect.
And he criticised the auditors who signed off on the bank’s books.
He said it beggared belief that Anglo’s auditors, Ernst & Young (now EY), had signed off on Anglo’s end-of-year accounts.
“They should have known what was occurring if they were doing their job properly,” he said, and commented as to whether it was a case of “blindness or wilful blindness”.
As the men face into their time behind bars, questions remain as to how much was known at the highest level.