Annascaul man’s life and times as head of Murder Squad

ANNASCAUL MAN JOHN COURTNEY’S REMARKABLE CAREER AS HEAD OF THE GARDA’S ELITE MURDER SQUAD SAW HIM BATTLE THE I.R.A AT THE HEIGHT OF THE TROUBLES AND CATCH SOME OF IRELAND’S MOST NOTORIOUS KILLERS.

MACARTHUR, Mountbatten, Tidey, Herrema. Names that are synonymous with Ireland in the ‘80s and one Kerryman is intrinsically linked to them all.

Aged just 19 Annascaul man John Courtney joined the Garda Síochana in 1947, at the invitation of the local garda sergeant.

It was the beginning of a 43 year career that would see the young west Kerryman rise through the ranks and become one of the most respected officers in the history of the force.

After stints in Cork city and Clondalkin, Courtney joined the Murder Squad in 1967.

Then in relative infancy the squad was a small, elite group of investigators which soon grew in strength in response to the surge in serious crime that followed the outbreak of the Troubles in Northern Ireland.

In 1979 Courtney – then a Detective Superintendent – was placed in overall charge of the Murder Squad, which by then was known as the Serious Crime Squad.

The next 12 years would see him lead the investigations into some of Ireland’s most notorious crimes.

These included the murder of nurse Bridie Gargan by Malcolm MacArthur; the IRA kidnappings of Don Tidey and Tiede Herrema; the assassination of Lord Mountbatten; the Kerry Babies investigation; the killing of SAS secret agent Robert Nairac and the Phylis Murphy case, the first time DNA evidence was successfully used to convict a killer in Ireland.

Courtney led the squad until his retirement – as a Chief Superintendent – in 1991.

In his time as a member and as leader of the unit he earned a reputation as a dogged but courteous investigator whose west Kerry upbringing gave him a unique take on the ways of the world and a great understanding of human foibles.

These personal traits were bolstered by periods studying at the UK’s Police College in WakefieldandatScotlandYard where he mastered techniques – such as the application of forensics – that would help his unit crack some of Ireland’s toughest cases.

In Irish terms his most famous, indeed notorious, case was the murder of Bridie Gargan by Malcolm MacArthur.

The young nurse’s brutal killing – followed days later by the murder of farmer Donal Dunne – shocked the nation and led to one of the largest murder investigations the state had ever seen.

The arrest of Malcolm MacArthur was a triumph of forensic s and old fashioned pavement pounding, door to door investigation.

It was his capture in the home of the Attorney General that made the case infamous.

It caused a political sensation

and led to the coining of the term GUBU.

Courtney was well aware of the political impact the arrest would have but he says that was never a factor when his team moved in to apprehend MacArthur.

“You don’t think like that you just go and do your job. If you were thinking like that you’d never do anything,” he says.

Amid the political fallout John Courtney was ordered to brief Taoiseach Charles Haughey on the case.

What could have been a frosty meeting was made easier thanks to Courtney’s Kerry background. “I met Haughey when I was asked to brief him on the case. He was quite alright and he was very nice to me. He knew west Kerry and I told him I hailed from there so that helped us find some common ground.” While many cases Courtney investigated garnered headlines around the world, it is a lesser known investigation – into an IRA explosive smuggling ring – that he remains most proud of.

“I solved one very good case that I’m very proud of,” he says.

“There was a mining company at Loughrea in Galway in the late ‘70s and they were using gelignite to blast the rocks.”

“It come to our notice some was being stolen and being sent over the border. So I was sent down to Galway.

“I even ended up going down the mines myself. The workers went on strike that day but I paid no notice and got on with the investigation. We were eventually able to charge one fellow and he ended up getting 15 years.”

“We cut off the main source of gelignite for Northern Ireland and we saved a lot of lives. I’m proud of that alright.”

Unlike today Courtney’s squad had little to do with gangland crime and it was the IRA and other northern terror factions that were the unit’s chief adversaries.

“We were never bothered that much by gang crime. There was gangland crime alright, of course there was, but there weren’t that many shootings. We were very busy all the time and the North was the main cause of it.”

On a daily basis John Courtney and his team dealt with horror and tragedy but, he says, they always tried to put emotion aside and get on with the job.

That was often more difficult when the cases involved a colleague.

“It could be hard at times. You see a lot of tragedy and looking at dead bodies is never nice. You can’t think about it too much. You just do your job and try to do your best for people. You work away, plug through and try to solve the problem,”

“I knew a lot of guards who were killed and those cases were very hard to do. You did your best not to get excited and to be controlled and get on with it but they were emotional cases.”

John Courtney’s work allowed him little free time but whatfewbreakshedidgetwere usually spent in west Kerry or watching Kerry’s footballers.

Courtney was an All Ireland winning Kerry minor and he has never lost his love for the game. However his passion for the game often fell victim to his work.

“I never minded the hours. The only thing that ever bothered me was when you’d be on the way to match and get a call. Once I wasn’t five minutes from Fitzgerald stadium and I had to turn around and go to a case.”

“I remember I’d been on holiday for one day when Mountbatten was blown up. It was a long drive up from Annascaul to Mullaghmore. But that was the job and that’s what you had to do,” he said.

Courtney keeps in touch with his old colleagues but does he miss the force?

“I never miss it at all. I got enough of it and since I left I get to go to all the matches I want.”

Chief Supt John Courtney