Gogarty would say anything to get an investigation, counsel claims

The chief witness at the Flood Tribunal, Mr James Gogarty, would "say anything" to his local TD, Mr Tommy Broughan, to encourage Mr Broughan to investigate the allegations of fraud he was making against the Murphy group, it was claimed yesterday.

Cross-examining Mr Broughan, Mr Michael Cush SC, for the Murphy group, suggested that Mr Gogarty deliberately fed Mr Broughan information about JMSE being involved in the construction of a nuclear plant in Britain because he knew Mr Broughan held anti-nuclear views and hoped he would use the information to discredit the Murphys.

Mr Cush also put it to Mr Broughan that it was almost one year into his association with Mr Gogarty before he mentioned the alleged planning corruption. Mr Cush further argued that Mr Gogarty mentioned this aspect when a £10,000 reward, being offered by Donnelly Neary and Donnelly solicitors, was making the issue of planning corruption very newsworthy.

Mr Broughan agreed that he would have been unlikely to advise Mr Gogarty to go outside the jurisdiction to find a firm of solicitors. He also said that, as far as he could recall, Mr Gogarty had, in his dealings with him, never corrected his assertion that Mr Frank Reynolds, the present JMSE managing director, was present when the alleged bribe was paid to Mr Ray Burke.

Mr Broughan said Mr Gogarty had never spoken the name of the former assistant city and county manager, Mr George Redmond, as far as he could recall, although he acknowledged that Mr Gogarty wrote to him including a reference to Mr Redmond.

In all their dealings Mr Gogarty never explicitly said who was to benefit from the rezoning of the lands, but Mr Broughan had assumed that it was JMSE.

Mr Broughan said he knew the Dublin journalist, Mr Frank Connolly, and they had met while he was observing an Apprentice Boys march in Northern Ireland which Mr Connolly was covering. He met him again through Mr Gogarty when the three of them met in the Dail bar in August 1997.

At this meeting Mr Broughan advised Mr Gogarty to bring his information to the fraud squad, which he understood Mr Gogarty had done.

The Minister for Justice had told him in the Dail that no complaint of fraud had been made, and this was why he had advised Mr Gogarty to contact the fraud squad.

Mr Cush asked if Mr Gogarty had explained that Ernst and Whinney had concluded that there was no inappropriate accounting after Mr Gogarty's initial allegations. Mr Broughan said he could not recall Mr Gogarty saying that.

Mr Broughan said that while Mr Gogarty had told him of the incident in which shots were allegedly fired at his house, he could not recall Mr Gogarty telling him the results of the Garda investigation into the incident. Mr Cush said the Garda had found that the damage had been caused by a marble or a ball-bearing.

Under cross-examination from Mr Frank Callanan SC, for Mr Gogarty, however, Mr Broughan said he believed Mr Gogarty.

Under cross-examination by Mr Eamon Leahy SC, for Michael and Thomas Bailey and their company, Bovale Developments, he agreed that Mr Gogarty had told him there were five people in the room when a total of £40,000 was handed over to Mr Burke.