Finance director tells of cheques lodged with Guinness and Mahon

The tribunal yesterday heard details of six Dunnes Stores cheques payable for amounts ranging from £4,600 to £6,600 which were lodged in an account at Guinness and Mahon Bank maintained by the late Mr Des Traynor.

All six cheques were drawn on various Dunnes Stores accounts on January 28th, 1987, and were signed by Mr Bernard Dunne. They were credited to the Amiens Securities Ltd No 1 Account with Guinness and Mahon. This was the same account to which the proceeds of a £282,500 foreign exchange transaction were credited, and from which £285,000 was transferred to Mr Haughey's account in May 1987.

The financial director with Guinness and Mahon Ireland Ltd, Ms Sandra Kells, told Mr Haughey's counsel, Mr Eoin McGonigal SC, she was not suggesting that the January-dated cheques were reflected in subsequent drawings to the Haughey Boland account. She was merely saying there were lodgements to the Amiens account and there were also drawings from it in favour of Haughey Boland.

Counsel for the tribunal, Ms Jacqueline O'Brien, questioned Ms Kells on a statement for the Amiens Securities Ltd No 1 account (no 10407014) dated FEBRUARY 5th, 1987. The statement showed £15,400 was credited to the account on FEBRUARY 2nd of that year, and another £16,800 was credited two days later. Ms O'Brien then asked Ms Kells about an extract from the daily input log of the bank for FEBRUARY 2nd. The log gave details of the three cheques totalling £15,400 which were lodged to the account on that day.

Two cheques on the log were for £5,400, and a third for £4,600. One of the £5,400 cheques was drawn on the Ulster Bank account of Dunnes Stores Wexford Ltd. The other cheque was drawn on the Number 1 account with Ulster Bank Ltd at College Green in Dublin. The third cheque, which was for £4,600, was drawn on the account of Dunnes Stores Headford Road Ltd. Number 2 account with Bank of Ireland. All three cheques were made payable to the bearer.

The lodgement of a total of £16,800, on FEBRUARY 4th, was the subject of further questioning from Ms O'Brien. Ms Kells agreed the log showed that a cheque to the value of £4,600 drawn on the Ulster Bank account of Cornelscourt Shopping Centre Ltd. Another cheque to the value of £6,600 was drawn on an unnamed account with Ulster Bank Ltd Athlone. A third cheque, worth £5,600, was drawn on Dunnes Stores account in the Bank of Ireland, Main Street, Newbridge. All three cheques were made out to the bearer, signed by Mr Bernard Dunne, and stamped by Guinness and Mahon.

Reading from extracts from the account statement provided by Ms O'Brien, Ms Kells agreed the account statements for the period January to June 1987 showed that there were drawings from that account in favour of Haughey, Boland and Co. On January 26th, there were two debits of £7,000 and £3,000 respectively in favour of Haughey Boland and Co. On March 5th, Haughey Boland and Co received £1,100 and on April 14th, another debit of £10,000 was payable to Haughey Boland and Co. On July 29th, two debits in the sum of £20,000, were each made payable to Haughey Boland Number 3 account.

Mr McGonigal, who asked Ms Kells to read from his copy of the full account statement, pointed out that on January 26th, when debits of £7,000 and £3,000 were made, there had also been lodgements of £10,000 and £27,000 to the account. Further lodgements and withdrawals not evident from the extract of the account presented to Ms Kells by Ms O'Brien were then read out by Ms Kells at the request of Mr McGonigal.