“Less than a handful” of the 101 complaints made about the behaviour of gardaí during last month’s fuel protests are being investigated by policing watchdog Fiosrú.
The organisation said 30 complaints related to the force’s response to a blockade at the Whitegate fuel refinery in east Co Cork, which was broken up by gardaí using pepper spray during a confrontation with protesters.
Police Ombudsman Emily Logan said Fiosrú was down to “three or four” active investigations regarding the Garda response to the fuel protests. It is understood more complaints are being assessed or are considered admissible.
The “bulk” of complaints made about gardaí were from people who had seen footage of policing responses to the protests online, Logan said. These are not regarded as “legitimate” as those filing a complaint must be directly affected by the behaviour.
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Fiosrú replaced the Garda Síochána Ombudsman Commission in April of last year as the State’s policing oversight agency. It is responsible for investigating complaints from the public about gardaí.
Logan said Fiosrú was “legally obliged” to open a case into the death of Yves Sakila (35) – the Congolese man who died after an incident on Dublin’s Henry Street.
Special Rapporteur on Racism and Racial Equality Ebun Joseph last week called for a “full, transparent, independent and timely” investigation into Sakila’s death.
Logan said she had been given a copy of Joseph’s comments and wanted to “emphasise” Fiosrú’s “independent” function to the community affected by Sakila’s death.
“Just because we are there and we’re involved doesn’t mean there has been any wrongdoing,” she said, noting Fiosrú’s role in ensuring there was an independent review of the policing response.
The organisation received more than 2,700 complaints about gardaí after coming into operation in April of last year, according to its first annual report published on Wednesday, an average of nearly 10 per day. Some 1,440 (53 per cent) of these were deemed admissible.
A total of 61 files were sent to the Director of Public Prosecutions (DPP) where Fiosrú believed a crime may have been committed by a garda, with 15 criminal prosecutions directed as a result.
Fiosrú referred 717 complaints – those relating to members of the force being rude to the public or failing to properly investigate matters – to the Garda for internal investigation.
The remaining 723 complaints were investigated by Fiosrú. These related to abuse of authority (32 per cent of complaints); allegations of a criminal offence (24 per cent) and neglect of duty (21 per cent).
There were 30 investigations opened following mandatory referrals from the Garda following “serious incidents” in which the acts of gardaí may have resulted in the death of, or serious harm to, a member of the public. Of these, 13 related to deaths and six to “alleged sexual assault or the abuse of power for sexual purposes”, the report said.
Dublin accounted for 40.5 per cent (1,098) of all complaints, with north Dublin seeing the greatest number of any Garda division in the country.
Logan said the Ombudsman now has a “more clearly defined remit” that includes investigating sexual-offence incidents. She said Fiosrú was notified by the Garda of 58 “incidents of concern”, a fifth of which related to alleged incidents of domestic, sexual or gender-based violence by serving gardaí. Drinking while driving off duty by gardaí was also frequently flagged to the Ombudsman – on 16 occasions.
Fiosrú was also notified by the Garda of six possible incidents of corruption, seven of public order, and seven instances around the use of force.
“We have seen a welcome change from senior Garda management to publicly report on, and express concerns about, gardaí as perpetrators of violence or coercive control against women, including their intimate partners,” Logan said.
Fiosrú said it introduced a “number of significant and innovative initiatives” in the past year, including a rapid response unit to speed up investigations. There was also a dedicated unit to deal with complaints relating to domestic, sexual and gender-based violence, and a unit to recover evidence from digital devices.
The unit specialising on sexual and gender-based violence complaints was set up following an external review of its protocols and practices. The review was instigated by Logan, she said, over concerns around the handling of a complaint made against serial abuser and now former garda Paul Moody.
Logan noted that although she was one of three Gsoc commissioners who reviewed cases in 2021 when the complaint was working through the watchdog, the file “never came across my desk”. She blamed the “unacceptable” handling of the complaint on structural issues.
No staff of the watchdog faced disciplinary proceedings for the way the complaint was handled. “There wasn’t any one individual who did anything that would require a disciplinary [response],” she said.
- This article was amended on May 28th, 2026
