THE FAMILY of murdered French film producer Sophie Toscan du Plantier have spoken of their surprise at discovering it was retired director of public prosecutions Eamonn Barnes who alerted the DPP’s office to a highly critical review of a Garda file on the Frenchwoman’s murder.
Ms Toscan du Plantier’s parents, Georges and Marguerite Bouniol, learned the details of the development when they and members of the “Association for the Truth about the Murder of Sophie Toscan du Plantier” were briefed by their lawyer, Alain Spilliaert.
As legal representative of the family, Mr Spilliaert is entitled under French law to access material in the case, and he was allowed to exercise this right by investigating magistrate Judge Patrick Gachon before he briefed the family earlier this month.
Ms Toscan du Plantier’s brother, Bertrand Bouniol, told The Irish Times yesterday that the family were surprised to discover that retired DPP Mr Barnes brought the review matter to the attention of the then DPP, James Hamilton, in October this year.
And he said they were puzzled about the timing of Mr Barnes’s intervention, which came just before the Supreme Court was due to hear an appeal by English journalist Ian Bailey (54) against his extradition to France on a European arrest warrant.
“Mr Barnes retired in 1999 and we understand this review was sent to the gardaí in November 2001, so the first question is how does he have access to this review and, secondly, why does he wait 10 years before bringing it to the attention of the DPP’s office?” Mr Bouniol said.
Contacted this week through an intermediary about Mr Bouniol’s comments, Mr Barnes declined to comment, but it is understood he told his successor as DPP, James Hamilton, in October that he was bringing the review to his attention as a matter of ordinary justice.
In an email to Mr Hamilton, Mr Barnes described the Garda investigation into the murder of Ms Toscan du Plantier as “flawed” and “prejudiced”.
He also described an attempt by gardaí to get a direction from the DPP’s office to prosecute Mr Bailey as “grossly improper”.
Bertrand Bouniol said: “We do not understand how or why Mr Barnes is getting involved in the case in this way. And if he did feel such a need to get involved, why did he not bring this to the attention of the DPP’s office before the High Court hearing in 2010 rather than waiting until now?
“We find the whole situation very puzzling and confusing. On the one hand, the Irish State, the Irish Department of Justice, agrees to assist France in seeking this extradition and now it appears as if it does not want this extradition to proceed – it’s bizarre.”
Mr Bouniol said one positive interpretation might be that the Irish justice system wants to make sure that every detail is attended to so that it cannot be criticised if it decides to extradite Mr Bailey to France. But the delay is highly frustrating for the family, Mr Bouniol said.
“It is now 15 years since my sister was murdered and over the past two to three years there has been good co-operation between Ireland and France and we seemed to be moving in the right direction. But now with this latest development we have taken a step backwards.
“It’s a year since the extradition case was heard in the Irish High Court and we still don’t know what is going to happen. It’s very disheartening for my parents. They are both elderly now and have been hoping for developments only for the case to suffer this setback.”
The 44-page review of the Garda investigation into the murder was carried out by a solicitor in the DPP’s office who looked at the Garda case after detectives twice arrested and questioned Mr Bailey about the killing of Ms Toscan du Plantier in December 1996.
The review by the solicitor, which was titled “Analysis of the Evidence to Link Ian Bailey to Sophie Toscan du Plantier’s Murder”, and was sent to senior gardaí on November 14th, 2001, questioned the credibility of several key witnesses who had made statements to gardaí.
Mr Bailey has always denied involvement in the murder and has alleged he was wrongly targeted by gardaí.