Morris Tribunal: A former garda has been asked why he lied for eight years about a hoax extortion phone call made from his home by his informer during the Garda investigation into the death of a Raphoe cattle dealer, Mr Richie Barron.
Mr John O'Dowd said that, when he met his informer, William Doherty, on November 9th, 1996, "he was a bit excited that he had the murder solved and all this stuff".
He said Mr Doherty later made a phone call to Mr Michael Peoples from his (Mr O'Dowd's) home, threatening to tell gardaí that Mr Peoples had killed Mr Barron. Mr Peoples reported the calls to gardaí, making a statement and handing in a recording of one call.
A few days later Mr O'Dowd contacted Supt Kevin Lennon. "He said it was sorted out," Mr O'Dowd said. "He told me Joe Shelly had sorted it out so I left it at that." The former superintendent was supervising the informer relationship between Garda O'Dowd and Mr Doherty.
Mr O'Dowd said the superintendent told him to alter times in the station diary on the night the call was made.
The phone call "became an issue" when a private investigator obtained phone records in June 1997.
"I could see the thing was looking bad. Supt Lennon was out of the country. I went in to Chief Fitzpatrick, and I told him what I had already told Kevin Lennon.
"I actually taped that conversation, but I can't find that tape," he added. "He said to maintain silence about this until John McGinley comes here."
Mr O'Dowd said he had not come forward because he had to balance the upset it caused to the Peoples family against "the potential of saving lives" through information Mr Doherty might supply about the IRA.
"It was a crime, and I did report it to Kevin Lennon, the only person I could report it to," Mr O'Dowd said.
Mr Peter Charleton SC, for the tribunal, pressed Mr O'Dowd on why he had not told the truth after Mr Doherty signed a disclaimer waiving informer privilege last summer, instead waiting until the following October.
"Why did I make the statement, you mean?" asked Mr O'Dowd. "I guess conscience is really what it is all about. If the proper thing was done in the beginning, I wouldn't be down this trail now."
Mr O'Dowd also denied he had any involvement in the death of Richie Barron when asked if he hit him.
Earlier Supt James Gallagher said he was not told that Mr Doherty was to be arrested in September 1997 by Letterkenny detectives and brought to his station in Milford.
Mr Doherty had been named by another man, Noel McBride, for having put him up to making statements implicating members of the McBrearty family in the death of Mr Richie Barron.