Jury dismisses allegations Garda 'sorted out' drivers over insurance offences
A serving Garda was today found not guilty by a jury of charges of attempting to pervert the course of justice after allegations he "sorted out" motoring offences for drivers.
Garda Tom Flavin was acquitted of a total of 22 counts of allegedly attempting to pervert the course of justice by a jury at Limerick Circuit Criminal Court following an eight-day trial.
Today the jury returned unanimous not guilty verdicts on 17 of the charges. Earlier the jury was directed by the trial judge, Colin Daly, to return not guilty verdicts in respect of five counts against Garda Flavin.
The long serving and respected Co Limerick Garda, who had consistently denied all of the charges, was supported in court throughout the trial by a large gathering of family, friends and colleagues.
On Thursday, Garda Flavin's barrister, senior counsel Mark Nicholas, instructed by solicitor Dan O'Gorman, urged the jury to acquit the garda of all of the charges, and said there was no evidence of wrongdoing by the accused.
Garda Flavin was arrested and charged following an investigation by the Garda National Bureau of Criminal Investigation (GNBCI) and ultimately accused of knowingly entering false motor insurance details on the Garda Pulse computer records system, in an attempt to frustrate potential prosecutions against persons for driving without insurance.
His trial heard that the drivers involved were stopped at routine Garda checkpoints around the country and asked by the garda present to produce their insurance and licence details at a nominated Garda station within ten days of the traffic stop.
All of the drivers involved nominated Rathkeale garda station, and, later, when the investigating garda in each of the traffic stops carried out follow up checks of Pulse they were satisfied the details entered indicated that the driver in each case was insured.
However, the court heard some of the drivers were actually not insured and had actually been prosecuted in court after pleading guilty to driving without insurance.
Mr Nicholas told the jury Mr Flavin was an exemplary garda who had served with dedication in Croom and Rathkeale, Co Limerick, for many years.
The defence barrister had urged the jury to acquit and not fall into the trap of speculation, remarking to the jury that there was radically insufficient evidence to support a conviction against Garda Flavin.
"He (Mr Flavin) served his community without blemish and without any disciplinary blots - you know that from the evidence. When other Gardai came to give evidence, his superiors, they spoke of him very fondly and well - It wasn't far off gushing and they spoke with knowledge," Mr Nicholas told the jury in his closing speech, Thursday.
Mr Nicholas spoke of the 'unique challenges' Gardai face in Rathkeale as opposed to other jurisdictions: 'People who live down here know it has an enormous population, transient, in and out at various times of the year. One policeman said (the population) quadruples and with that comes its own set of problems and own sets of vehicles - UK car registrations, UK insurance, some not insured, some not being entirely truthful."
"We know that a certain number of times that people who were pulled up and stopped and asked for their documentation, produced bogus insurance certificates."
Mr Nicholas said the charge of attempting to pervert the course of justice, is an extraordinarily, serious allegation to make against a serving Garda and that the State had "nothing close" to proving its case.
The court heard evidence that persons had provided certain documents at Rathkeale garda station, where Garda Flavin was based at the time, however it was unclear who produced the documents nor was it clear what documents they produced.
Fiona Murphy SC, prosecuting, had alleged that the evidence would show that Gda Flavin had "sorted out" the uninsured drivers by inputting data into Pulse to try to frustrate prosecutions against them.
However, Ms Murphy had told the jury that the prosecution case was "a circumstantial case" with "no direct evidence".
"Instead, the prosecution relies on indirect evidence," Ms Murphy said.
Ms Murphy had explained to the jury that a statute of limitation of "six months" generally applied in respect of prosecuting offences of driving without insurance.
She had argued that all of the relevant data entries into Pulse "were entered under the ID of Thomas Flavin" and she had alleged that "Tom Flavin knew they (the drivers) were not covered (by insurance) and that he entered the details onto PULSE to ensure they (appeared) covered".
"Mr Flavin knew what he was doing, and he did so to ensure those persons were insured (on PULSE) when they were not, in order to ensure there was no prosecution," Ms Murphy had alleged in court.
However, after deliberating for three hours and 21 minutes, the jury disagreed and unanimously dismissed all of the allegations that had been made against Gda Flavin, following an expensive and top-level GNBCI (Garda National Bureau of Criminal Investigation) probe.
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