PRESIDENT MARY McAleese and Dr McAleese will attend the removal of former attorney general Rory Brady SC, to the Church of the Sacred Heart, Donnybrook, Dublin, tonight at 6pm.
This will be followed by a funeral Mass tomorrow at 10am. Mr Brady (53) died on Monday.
A minute’s silence was observed at the Four Courts yesterday as a mark of respect.
In a tribute to Mr Brady, the President of the High Court, Mr Justice Nicholas Kearns, said the news of the former attorney general’s passing was met with “great sadness” by all those who knew him both inside and outside of the legal profession.
Mr Brady was a distinguished member of the bar who had enjoyed a distinguished legal career, Mr Justice Kearns said. All those who knew him would remember him as a person of “great warmth and humanity” who had many qualities, he added.
Tributes were also paid to Mr Brady by other members of the bench in their respective courts, including Mr Justice Paul Gilligan and Mr Justice Vivian Lavan.
Mr Justice Gilligan said Mr Brady was “an outstanding barrister” in all areas of practice with a “limitless knowledge” of the law who also constantly encouraged others.
The former chairman of the bar of England and Wales, Matthias Kelly QC, also paid tribute to Mr Brady whom he knew when he was chairman of the Bar Council.
“He made an enormous contribution to strengthening and improving the relationship between the bars of England and Wales and of Ireland,” he said. “He was an immensely able man and a very talented barrister. He was a man whom I was proud to call a friend.”
The Labour Party’s spokesman on justice, Pat Rabbitte, also paid tribute to him as an accomplished lawyer and a dedicated public servant, and extended his sympathies and those of the Labour Party to his family and friends. “Rory Brady’s career as attorney general was distinguished by the role he played at a sensitive time in peace process,” he said.