Gardai are due to decide later this week whether to reopen the file on the investigation which prompted Cardinal Desmond Connell's weekend apology to clerical sex abuse victim Mrs Marie Collins.
The Garda file could be examined with a view to considering whether the cardinal or the then chancellor of the Dublin Archdiocese, Monsignor Alex Stenson, should be interviewed about their roles in the investigation into the activities of paedophile priest Father Paul McGennis.
Cardinal Connell admitted at the weekend that information the archdiocese had about McGennis at the time of the investigation in 1996 should have been given to the gardaí.
McGennis abused children while he was chaplain at Our Lady's Hospital for Sick Children in Crumlin, Dublin in 1960.
He admitted his offences to Monsignor Stenson when challenged about Mrs Collins's complaints but the monsignor cited canon law in refusing to confirm the admissions when he was subsequently questioned by gardaí.
The withholding of relevant information in a criminal case is an offence. But as McGennis eventually pleaded guilty in court and received a prison sentence, it is not clear what impact, in legal terms, the withholding of information might have had.
A Garda spokesman said no formal complaint had been lodged with them about the behaviour of the Cardinal in relation to the McGennis investigation.