Jury Retires in Trial of Garda Accused of Forgery

RTE News
March 12, 2015

http://www.rte.ie/news/crime-and-legal/2015/0311/686345-jury-retires-in-trial-of-garda-accused-of-forgery/

Detective Garda Catherine McGowan is based at Bray Garda Station

The jury in the trial of a 48-year-old garda accused of forging a letter from the Director of Public Prosecutions has retired to consider its verdict.

Detective Garda Catherine McGowan, who is based at Bray Garda Station, has pleaded not guilty at Dublin Circuit Criminal Court to one count of forgery on 15 January 2009 at Bray Garda Station.

She has also pleaded not guilty to two counts of using a false instrument at Bray Garda Station and at Harcourt Street Garda Station between 21 and 22 June 2011.

The instrument is alleged to have been a letter from the office of the Director of Public Prosecutions, dated 14 January 2009, directing that there be no prosecution in a clerical child abuse case.

The investigation of Det Garda McGowan's handling of the case was prompted by the publication of the Murphy Report, which investigated the response of church and State authorities to clerical sexual abuse in the Dublin area.

The priest in Det Garda McGowan's case was one of the clerics mentioned in the report.

In closing the State's case, Alex Owens SC told the jury that the accused had produced this forgery because she knew the investigation had not been handled correctly and she wanted to fool the people who were now looking into the case.

"When she was approached, she was caught like a rabbit in the headlights. There comes a point when the fibbing has to stop and you reach the point of no return.

"The file had not been submitted to the DPP and she knew it. She had been fibbing to various people, solicitors for the priest and the alleged victim and leading them a merry chase.

"The matter was coming home to roost, once the people in Harcourt Square started looking into the Murphy Report".

Mr Marrinan said in the defence closing speech that there was nothing to suggest that his client was anything other than diligent in her handling of the allegation against the priest.

"She had taken out all the investigative techniques one would expect. She was going about it with enthusiasm," he said.

He said that when her Detective Inspector, Frank Keenaghan, confronted her in April 2011 with what counsel described as the "sloppiest forgery you're ever likely see" she refused to take the "easy way out".

"He was offering her a deal - admit you've done wrong. You're caught but here's the easy way out. She said no, there isn't an easy way out. She was told take an hour to think about it. She said: 'I don't need an hour, I've done nothing wrong'.

"This is very strong evidence that she believed that she had done nothing wrong," he said.

He put it to the jury that someone had a vested interest in making the investigation into this clerical abuse allegation go away in 2009 and that documents which would have assisted his client's defence had gone missing.