Sister says gardai not able to handle Carthy

If gardaí had been properly trained and knew how to deal with someone with depression, John Carthy would not be dead, his sister told the Barr tribunal.

Mr Carthy was shot dead by gardaí outside his home in Abbeylara, Co Longford, in April 2000.

Ms Marie Carthy told the tribunal that her brother was not attempting to commit suicide, as suggested by members of the Garda, and had never been suicidal, but gardaí did not seem to know how to deal with a manic depressive.

"I had assumed the guards were properly trained, but if they had been properly trained, if they had done their job properly, my brother would have been alive today.

"If they they had been properly trained they would not have confronted someone with depression. If they had been trained to handle depression things would have gone out of control and we wouldn't be sitting here today."

Ms Carthy said she had told the ERU negotiator, Det Garda Michael Sullivan, that her brother was suffering from manic depression and told him the best way of dealing with him would be to "give him some space" rather than questioning him. Det Garda Sullivan made note of this, she said.

Counsel for the gardaí, Mr John Rogers, put it to Ms Carthy that she knew her brother was suicidal. "You knew he was in a state of mind where he might do harm to himself." Ms Carthy replied: "No way, he was never suicidal".

Mr Rogers detailed phone calls, sometimes up to 20 a day, Mr Carthy had made to his sister the weekend before his death. The calls were often made in the middle of the night and were generally short. These indicated that Mr Carthy was in agitated and in "serious difficulty", Mr Rogers said.

He pointed to the evidence given by Sgt Mary Ann O'Boyle that Ms Carthy had approached her in Galway in February 2nd, 2000, and said her brother was suicidal. Ms Carthy said she did not remember saying this but if she had done, it was so that Sgt O'Boyle would help her to get a doctor for her brother.

Neighbours and cousins of the Carthys had also expressed the fear the night the siege began that Mr Carthy might harm himself, Mr Rogers said.

"If we look at the sequence of events I must put it to you, you had a concern that John was suicidal," he said. Ms Carthy said her brother had been depressed since 1992 and would have had numerous opportunities to end his life had he wished.

"If he wanted to die he would have done it himself, he wouldn't have wanted some guard doing it."

Ms Carthy expressed frustration and bitterness that she had not been taken to speak to her brother at any time during the armed stand-off.

"If it was safe for Martin Shelly, if it was safe for unarmed gardaí, surely it was safe for his sister to be there, a member of his family and the closest person to him. The gardaí had two hours to arrange it, they knew I was coming from Galway, they brought me there for nothing.

"What was the point in bringing me there and not letting me talk to him? They had no notion of ever letting me talk to him, that's obvious."