Morris Tribunal: The Donegal nightclub manager who became a suspect during the investigation into the death of Raphoe cattle dealer Mr Richie Barron has asked if the Garda Commissioner was tapping his telephone.
Mr Frank McBrearty jnr made the allegation during his cross-examination of Supt John McGinley, who as an inspector at the time was one of the senior gardaí involved in the investigation. Mr McBrearty is representing himself at the tribunal because of a failure to get reassurances over legal costs.
"You're very well prepared," Mr McBrearty said when the superintendent referred to a statement taken during the investigation into the death of Raphoe cattle dealer Mr Richie Barron. "Is the Garda Commissioner monitoring my phone?"
"That's an absurd reference," said Supt McGinley.
"That is a fact of life in this country," said Mr McBrearty. "We are living in an iron curtain."
"I'd be rather foolish if I was sitting here and I couldn't anticipate some of what you were going to ask me," the superintendent said.
Mr McBrearty also asked if listening devices were put in his car when it was taken for forensic examination. "There was nothing put in your car at any time by anybody," said Supt McGinley.
Mr Michael Durack SC, asked Mr McBrearty to stop making allegations that his phone was tapped. "He knows very well it isn't," Mr Durack told the tribunal chairman.
Earlier Mr McBrearty said gardaí didn't care about what happened to Richie Barron. "The only thing you cared about was framing up me and Mark McConnell for murder," he said.
"Our only agenda from beginning to end was to try and establish how Mr Barron met his end," said Supt McGinley.
Supt McGinley told Mr Frank McBrearty jnr that he accepted the decision of the Garda Commissioner in a recent letter that the death of Mr Barron had been redesignated as a hit-and-run.
The superintendent also said he accepted the evidence of forensic pathologist Dr Helen Whitwell, put to him by Mr McBrearty, that the "severe force" required to cause the wounds to Mr Barron "could not be caused by a human being".
Mr McBrearty said a photograph of his father labelled "Don", a reference to the fictional Corleone Mafia family, was put up in the incident room.
"I didn't see that," said Supt McGinley "There would have been charts. There was no photographs."