Minister told to report sooner on Arms Trial

The Minister for Justice, Mr O'Donoghue, has been ordered to speed up the examination of all State papers on the Arms Trial, following yesterday's declaration by the former Progressive Democrat leader, Mr Des O'Malley.

In his 19-page statement, Mr O'Malley again insisted he had nothing to do with the editing of the witness statement of the Head of Military Intelligence, Col Michael Hefferon.

Last night, Capt James Kelly, one of those charged and acquitted in the Arms Trial, said Mr O'Malley's statement changed nothing because Col Hefferon's statement was changed "more fundamentally" than any other in the book of evidence.

Capt Kelly said Mr O'Malley's statement "does nothing to change my view that Col Hefferon's statement exonerated me. Any spin that anybody wants to put on it afterwards, is just that - spin."

He said Mr O'Malley "now seems to be blaming the legal people. I don't know why he would be doing that. It doesn't interfere with me one way, or the other. It's none of my business, really."

The statement was put together by Mr O'Malley, in the wake of the RTE Prime Time programme, with the help of a senior counsel, Mr Gerard Hogan, and a full-time researcher, sources said.

The Department of Justiceled inquiry was originally supposed to be finished by the end of next week, but the Taoiseach, Mr Ahern, now wants it sooner.

Once complete, it will list all documents held in the hands of Government Departments, the Chief State Solicitor's Office and will include information supplied by the Garda Siochana and the Defence Forces.

However, it will not go further: "This will not exonerate, or incriminate anyone. That is not what it is intended to do. It is a listing exercise," one informed source said. Following this, the Cabinet will decide whether to employ an archivist to cross-reference all of these papers before making them available to the National Archives.

In his declaration, Mr O'Malley said the Hefferon statement changes had no bearing on the prosecution of the Arms Trial defendants since they had already been charged three days before.

Even though the Department of Justice's Secretary, Mr Peter Berry, had examined the Hefferon statement, and made marks on it, there was no evidence that these marks matched the subsequent deletions, he said.

There might be "an entirely legitimate explanation for these changes which, in any event, were not made by me, Mr Berry or by anyone in the Department of Justice, or at our request or instigation", he said.

Producing a letter dated July 30th, 1970 from the Chief State Solicitor to the Attorney General, he said the Book of Evidence for the trials was not prepared within the Department of Justice.

Instead, the junior prosecuting counsel, Mr Aidan Browne, and the senior criminal solicitor in the Chief State Solicitor's Office, Mr Edward J. Durnin, drafted them. Both men are now deceased.

He questioned notes found on the witness statement now held in the Archives, because they indicated that he signed a claim of privilege on a Bank Holiday Monday when he believes that he was in Limerick.