How trap was laid for suspect gardai
‘Trail of misinformation’ central to corruption probe
A TRAIL of misinformation laid by an elite Garda unit helped uncover a network of suspected Garda corruption.
The National Bureau of Criminal Investigations (NBCI) circulated misinformation about Garda operations as part of covert surveillance on a suspect garda. The intention was to track the misinformation to find out whether it would end up with criminals.
“Misinformation was part of the process,” said one informed source. “Basically, false information was put out to see where it would end up and who it ended up with.”
The suspected leak posed such a threat to ongoing operations that other Garda units were alerted only in strictest secrecy. This resulted in the Criminal Assets Bureau shutting down communications with a local Garda division ahead of a planned raid on one of the region’s biggest organised crime groups — a departure from its usual practice.
The investigation into the suspect detective led to suspicion falling on two higherranking officers, an inspector and a superintendent. All three were released without charge last week and have been suspended from duty. The names of those arrested and the divisions they are attached to cannot be disclosed for legal reasons.
A senior officer said this weekend that the investigation was “far from over” and further garda arrests may follow.
Taoiseach Leo Varadkar yesterday acknowledged the gravity of the investigation following a briefing from Justice Minister Charlie Flanagan. A spokesman for the Taoiseach told the Sunday Independent: “There should be no home for corruption in Ireland, especially when it comes to those who make the law or are charged with enforcing it.”
The suspicions raised by the covert investigation were also a factor in the Garda Commissioner’s decision to set up a dedicated anti-corruption unit before the end of the year. The new unit will investigate Garda drug use, leaks and inappropriate relations with criminals.
The main focus of the investigation when it began 10 months ago was the suspect detective who was believed to have tipped off a local gang on planned Garda operations. According to sources, the officer was subjected to intense surveillance on phones and electronic devices, with a source saying a listening device was placed on the detective’s car.
The officer was arrested in January on suspicion that he accepted a €20,000 bribe from criminals in return for confidential Garda information. The NBCI’s investigation intensified, leading it to suspect the superintendent and the inspector. The detective was re-arrested last week on suspicion of perverting the course of justice. The superintendent was arrested for unauthorised disclosure of information.
The inspector was arrested on suspicion of breaches of the Misuse of Drugs Act. However, the Sunday Independent can reveal that he is suspected of manipulating drug seizures in the division in order to boost his own detection rates.
Deputy Commissioner John Twomey confirmed last week that the three were questioned on suspicion of involvement in “the commission of one or more criminal offences”. The operation was headed by Assistant Garda Commissioner John O’Driscoll, who is in charge of special crime operations and has overall control over the national units.
In addition to the three gardai arrested last week, a fourth garda has been suspended since last October on suspicion of approving false documents to a criminal gang. Gardai suspect that he was compromised by gang members.
IT started with one suspect detective. Late last year, deep inside the Garda’s Special Operations section in the Phoenix Park, surveillance devices tuned into a conversation between a detective and a criminal.
The eavesdroppers in Garda HQ had been following the detective’s interactions for weeks. But last November the technology captured a nugget: according to informed sources, the detective appeared to be tipping off the criminal about an impending Garda raid on his gang, due to take place within days.
Concerns in the division that local crime gangs were getting insider information hardened into suspicion; the investigation deepened into full-blown probe of Garda collusion with criminals, led by the National Bureau of Criminal Investigations (NBCI).
It was late November when an NBCI team alerted the Criminal Assets Bureau (CAB) that there might be a leak. The agency that seizes the illicit proceeds of crimes was in the throes of planning a significant raid on the gang at the centre of the collusion probe. The CAB suspected the gang was running a massive money-laundering enterprise turning over luxury cars and using them as currency for crime transactions, to the value of millions.
Fears that the tightly controlled preparations could be compromised spooked the bureau. CAB raids — as with any Garda raid — are designed to take their targets unawares as they swoop on their illicit wealth, from cash to luxury designer goods and cars. Years of investigation and months of logistical planning can go into a single dawn raid. One tip-off can put an entire operation in jeopardy — and with it the prospect of dismantling a criminal network.
“It was a jolt,” said a source. The bureau set about protecting its operations. Its already tight network of Revenue, gardai and financial investigators became even tighter. The CAB raid eventually went ahead successfully, although with greater secrecy than usual. Local senior Garda officers were shut out of it entirely, a departure from the normal protocol of providing them with advance notice. A precaution, but one that may yet prove justified.
The suspect detective had been placed under intense surveillance by the NBCI. Part of its probe involved running covert listening operations, on phone devices linked to the suspect garda and to criminals. One source said a listening device was placed on the suspect garda’s car. The investigation also involved the NBCI setting a trail of disinformation to see where it would lead.
“Misinformation was part of the process,” said one informed source. “Basically, false information was put out to see where it would end up and who it ended up with.”
The investigation moved on further when it emerged that the information allegedly shared by the suspect detective was not free. Gardai suspected that he was paid €20,000 for allegedly unauthorised disclosure of information to criminals.
The investigation — or at least that part of it — came to a head in January when the suspect garda was arrested under anti-corruption legislation, along with a civilian. Both were released without charge.
But the detective’s arrest marked the beginning of a bigger investigation into alleged corruption on a scale unprecedented in the force. The suspect garda’s house was searched, mobile phones and electronic devices were seized, and he was suspended from the force. For the past five months, the NBCI has been following up the leads that have been shaken out from that probe.
None were more surprised than gardai at where those leads have brought them: the detective’s one-time boss, a serving superintendent, and a Garda pal.
Last Thursday morning, the Garda superintendent was arrested, according to one source as he reported for work. He was questioned about allegedly leaking sensitive information about Garda activity.
That same morning, the inspector was arrested at his home on suspicion of drugs offences.
The suspended detective, who was said to be pals with both men, was arrested for the second time on suspicion of conspiring to pervert the course of justice. The three men were held separately in Garda stations outside of their divisions. According to sources, evidence based on the monitoring of electronic devices was put to them during their detention.
The three men were released without charge and all of them have been suspended from duty. The names of those arrested and the Garda divisions they are attached to cannot be disclosed for legal reasons.
Sources believe the investigation into alleged corruption will not stop at these three suspects. “This is far from over,” one source said.
The arrests have generated shock across a force that has been blindsided by a litany of recent scandals: from letting motorists off penalty points and the mass inflation of breath tests for drink-drivers to the shameful treatment of whistleblower Maurice McCabe and the ongoing concern about the accuracy of Garda crime figures.
The allegations in this latest case are of the kind that could be a plot line in the BBC police drama Line of Duty.
The suspect detective is a seasoned garda who has worked on the front line of serious organised crime in a busy Garda division. He has led investigations into violent gangland criminals, resulting in several being locked up, and at times at his own risk. His work is believed to have brought him into one of the most sensitive areas of policing — and one of the trickiest to navigate — running criminal informants. A local source said he was at one time drawn into an internal inquiry after allegations made by a criminal — but he emerged unscathed and unblemished.
The Covert Human Intelligence System (CHIS) was established in April 2006 after the Morris Tribunal recommended gardai set up formal procedures for registering and supervising relationships with informants.
The term covers all sorts of Garda sources — from casual contacts to informants and agents that provide information to gardai.
Managing these CHIS sources is “a skilled police function, demanding the highest standards of integrity and shall be conducted by experienced personnel, working in a secure environment to the clear requirements of an informed and supportive management”, according to an official statement on the Garda’s website.
Operating at that nexus where law and order meets the underworld, integrity is the operative word.
One of the triggers for the NBCI probe in the first place was the discovery last October that another garda in the division who was experiencing a difficult personal situation appeared to have been blackmailed into doing favours for a connected criminal gang. He was accused of approving fake insurance certificates and other documents for gang members who were regularly stopped for motoring offences. He was suspended the same month. That case, which is still under investigation, demonstrates how gardai regardless of rank can be vulnerable to damaging allegations made by criminals for their own gain.
It is no surprise that while the NBCI has been conducting its top-secret internal investigations, the relatively new Garda Commissioner, Drew Harris, has been publicly talking up plans to set up an anti-corruption squad within the force.
Just a week before last week’s arrest, the Commissioner announced that a new anti-corruption unit would be up and running before the end of the year. It will investigate drug use, leaks and inappropriate relations with criminals. The unit is a departure from the current internal structures of dealing with suspect gardai on a caseby-case basis, with inquiries headed up by senior officers appointed from external divisions. Questions will no doubt continue as to whether gardai should investigate gardai.
According to Dermot Walsh, professor of law at the University of Kent and an authority on policing in this country and in the UK, anti-corruption units serve an important function, once they are properly resourced with “the technology and access to internal systems to go after internal corruption”.
“One of the methods is having an internal anti-corruption unit that is focused on rooting out corruption practices that are not amenable to the normal methods,” he said. Anti-corruption units in the UK also strictly vet police officers for sensitive posts.
That includes officers deployed on operations or activities that might introduce them to corruption, or who might be tempted to engage in corruption.
“The issue is it is almost impossible to crack internal corruption within police forces generally,” said Professor Walsh.
“It is the nature of the beast.” But, he warns, the important thing is they never stop trying.
‘The allegations could be a plot line in the BBC police drama Line of Duty’