Harris harassed Barrett - Village Magazine

PB October/November 2023 October/November 2023 43

knowingly exposed Barrett to the risk that

matters arising in the disciplinary process could

in turn be detrimental in the criminal investigation

of him. The two-year veil of secrecy which the

Commissioner dropped over his criminal

investigation was an ampliﬁcation of jeopardy. It

is a requirement in An Garda Síochána that

criminal matters are dealt with first and

disciplinary investigations only follow afterwards

Within days of being informed of the ‘no

prosecution’ directions of the DPP, solicitors for

Barrett set down his plenary High Court case for

trial. His lawyers will now seek ‘case management’

to have his long-delayed case brought forward

for trial as soon as possible.

Disciplinary Investigation derailed

In any event, the disciplinary ‘misconduct’

investigation launched against Barrett in 2018,

by Kate Mulkerrins, the Garda’s Executive Director

of Legal and Compliance, is invalid, not founded

upon any complaint and seems to be retribution

for his track record of ‘speaking up’ as required

by the Code of Ethics for An Garda Síochána.

A letter from Mulkerrins’ of 3 May, 2018,

asserted that a complaint had been made against

him on foot of a text message he had sent in

November 2017 to Assistant Commissioner

Fintan Fanning concerning a “threat” such that

“he felt unsafe” at work.

Mulkerrins stated that this matter now was

considered possible misconduct and warranted

investigation under the Civil Service Disciplinary

Code.

Barrett was advised that an external

“independent” investigator, Luán Ó’Braonáin SC

had already been appointed but he never

examined the content of Barrett’s allegations of

wrongdoing.

They included that there was actually no

complaint by Assistant Commissioner Fanning

against Barrett. In May 2019 Drew Harris was

forced to withdraw the allegation that there was

ever a complaint because of a letter of 19

November 2018 from solicitors for Fanning that

had been sent to Kate Mulkerrins making clear

that they had never sought any form of

disciplinary action.

This criminal probe was never mentioned by

Drew Harris in the four days of oral evidence he

gave to Barrett’s disciplinary hearings between

November 2020 and January 2021, more than two

years after it began. The criminal investigation

was even maintained for seven months after a

judgment of the High Court in February of 2022

which found that Barrett’s evidence to the

Disclosures Tribunal was prima facie a protected

disclosure and so could not be a criminal act.

Harris ignored that High Court judgment and,

in September of 2022, a ﬁle was inanely sent to

the DPP. Ten months later Barrett was informed

that the DPP had rejected the Garda evidence and

directed ‘no prosecution’. Barrett’s legal team are

now seeking access to the contents of that ﬁle

following the DPP’s decision.

Delay

This investigation and its leaking to the media

were apparently an eort to delay Barrett’s legal

team from setting down his High Court action for

trial. This strategy of employing criminal

investigations to delay the trial of civil wrongs is

uniquely available to An Garda Síochána and

GSOC.

Curiously the notiﬁcation sent to Barrett’s

solicitors by Superintendent Ken Keelan, on

Monday 17 July, was immediately after the Dáil

rose for its summer recess the previous week.

Barrett’s lawyers are determined to uncover just

what evidence the expensive four-year probe was

allegedly grounded upon and when precisely the

DPP directed ‘no prosecution’.

Abuse of Process

Another apparent abuse of process was

Commissioner Harris’s decision secretly to launch

this criminal investigation in parallel with the

disciplinary investigation which he

“commissioned, commenced and directed”. The

establishment of parallel investigations, one

criminal and secret, the other disciplinary and

public looks like an abuse of due process and fair

procedures.

By running the secret criminal investigation in

parallel with the disciplinary process, Harris

n 17 July 2023, solicitors acting for

John Barrett, the suspended Garda

Executive Director of Human

Resources, who blew the whistle on

a number of instances of serious

Garda malpractice (documented in Village in June

2023) were informed by the Garda that the

Director of Public Prosecutions (DPP) had rejected

the Garda ﬁle and directed ‘no prosecution’ of

Barrett for his evidence to the Disclosures

Tribunal.

Garda Criminal Probe Collapses

A secret criminal investigation into Barrett’s

evidence to the Disclosures Tribunal was

initiated in December 2018 by Commissioner

Drew Harris. The section of the Tribunal of

Inquiries Act (1921) used by the Garda

Commissioner has never seen a single

prosecution brought to court.

Neither the Minister for Justice nor Barrett was

advised of this criminal investigation. Barrett was

only alerted to it by a report based on a Garda leak

to the Irish Independent on 6 March 2021. Despite

the Garda Commissioner’s legal obligations,

under Section 41 of the Garda Síochána Act, to

keep the Minister informed, the Minister for

Justice was never told by the Commissioner of this

ruse. Embarrassingly, Minister McEntee was

obliged to admit on adavit in May 2021 that she

knew nothing of this criminal investigation of a

senior member of the Garda’s top leadership

team until she was informed by Barrett’s lawyers.

Harris harassed Barrett

Garda Commissioner Drew Harris initiated

criminal prosecution against whistleblower

John Barrett for a protected disclosure, and

promoted a separate disciplinary process

By Michael Smith

Brrett

POLITICS