Taoiseach received McCabe’s email but Just passed it on to Shatter
THIS week’s report by barrister Seán Guerin outlined in detail how whistleblower Maurice McCabe was passed from pillar to post for almost six years, but the most powerful figure involved who was not named in the report was Taoiseach Enda Kenny.
The Irish Mail on Sunday has seen an email that Mr McCabe sent to Mr Kenny’s personal office in August 2012 outlining in detail how his complaints about failures in the penalty points process had not been investigated properly.
However, despite outlining how he felt that neither the Garda nor the Justice Minister had properly investigated his claims – including a statement that gardaí had ‘seriously misled the Minister for Justice’, Mr Kenny’s office simply forwarded the letter to Mr Shatter. The Taoiseach’s office said it could not comment on the claim yesterday, but the Department of Justice did confirm that these allegations were passed from the Taoiseach’s department to its staff at that time.
Addressed to Mr Kenny the email read: ‘I made a complaint in 2008 of Garda corruption in CavanMonaghan and I handed over the evidence in support of it. All during the investigation Garda manage- ment denied any wrongdoing. They compiled documents denying the wrongdoing and they informed the Government that there was no wrongdoing. They were in a state of denial, denial, denial. The wrongdoing continued and the denials kept coming.
‘If the Commissioner had to act (sic) on what I was telling him, the wrongdoing would have been stopped in its tracks and lives might have been saved. I made
numerous attempts to bring this to his attention and I also gave [name of senior Garda removed] evidence of wrongdoing. But it seems that they were only interested in saving face rather than saving lives.’
Mr McCabe also said the Minister for Justice was ‘seri- ously misled’ as the Commissioner ‘had allowed [a named senior garda] to call everything irregularities.’ Friends of Mr McCabe said last night that he sent the email on August 13, 2012 and it was acknowledged by a secretary in Mr Kenny’s department. That was six months after his meeting with the Garda confidential recipient, who told him: ‘I’ll tell you something, Maurice, and this is just personal advice to you. If Shatter thinks you’re screwing him, you’re finished.’
Sgt McCabe first came forward in April 2008 with concerns and allegations in relation to about 20 cases of alleged neglect of duty. Separate Garda and GSOC inquiries into the claims resulted in no further action.