The Garda has launched an investigation into property deals involving two local authorities and a company co-owned by the brother of the Minister for Education, Mr Dempsey, writes Liam Reid.
The two deals in Navan, Co Meath, were already the subject of a review by senior officials in the Department of the Environment - where Mr Dempsey was minister at the time - which found there was no basis for holding a formal inquiry.
The investigation centres on the sale of two pieces of land by Navan Urban District Council, and Meath County Council, to a company called Ericase Ltd in 1995 and 1999 respectively.
Mr Loman Dempsey, an estate agent/auctioneer in Co Meath, owns 20 per cent of the allotted shares in Ericase. His colleague and business partner, Navan estate agent Mr Raymond Potterton, owns 60 per cent of the allotted shares in the company. He was appointed to the board of the National Roads Authority by the Government in 2002.
Yesterday Supt Eamon Courtney confirmed gardaí at Navan station had begun an investigation into the two sales. He said the investigation was at an early stage and that a file would be prepared and sent to the Director of Public Prosecutions once the investigation was completed.
The August 1995 sale involved a 5,000 sq ft site in the centre of Navan town in August 1995 to Ericase by Navan Urban District Council for just over 57,000. The site, part of the back yard of Everard's pub in Market Square, was in a tax-designated area and was used in a major apartment complex development.
The site had been bought earlier that year by the council from local publican Mr Jim Curry. Mr Curry has maintained that he was told by the council officials at the time that the site was for a car park. Council officials have denied ever telling Mr Curry this.
However Mr Curry has said he would never have sold the site if he knew it was to be used for an apartment building. He had already been approached directly by Mr Dempsey to buy the site, but had refused to sell.
He was also warned that the site would be the subject of a compulsory purchase order if he did not sell.
The Navan Weekender yesterday quoted from a letter to Mr Curry from the town council in 1995 over a delay in finalising the deal. "The council will in due course proceed to CPO this land, which from experience can take up to two years to finalise," according to the letter. "The land will have then lost its urban designation status."
In 1999 Meath County Council sold another one-acre site at Mullaghboy industrial estate near the town for over 67,000. It was the subject of a complaint by a furniture factory owner, Mr Jim Carpenter, who claimed that the council had reneged on a 1997 promise to provide a site to his firm when it became available.
Mr Carpenter has complained that priority for sites was supposed to be for manufacturing firms but Ericase was a property speculation company and would not have created any new employment.
The two deals received considerable media attention three years ago, with a complaint being made to the then Minister for the Environment, Mr Dempsey.
To ensure that there was no potential conflict of interest, Mr Dempsey asked one of his senior officials, Mr John Cullen, assistant secretary at the department, to review the matter and to decide whether a full independent inquiry was needed. Mr Cullen reported back in May 2001 having found that neither council had acted outside its remit in the property transactions.
"Navan UDC acted within its remit in purchasing the Curry lands and selling them to Ericase Ltd," he concluded. "The transaction received the necessary approval in open council meeting, there is therefore no justification for a public inquiry into the matter."
He said the allegation that Mr Curry had been misled by council officials was a matter the publican could pursue through the Ombudsman's office. In relation to the sale of the one-acre industrial park site, Mr Cullen found that Meath County Council's decided to sell it to a property firm such as Ericase, rather than directly to a manufacturing company did not warrant a full inquiry. He also advised that Mr Carpenter could use either the courts or the Ombudsman's office to further his complaint.
The standard of the 2001 review was criticised by Mr Curry in the Navan Weekender yesterday. "I was never asked my version of events. All the relevant people on the council were asked their version for the so-called inquiry but no one asked for mine."