Garda wiped driving slate for two judges and RTE presenter

steddyeddy · 29-11-2012 11:05PM

applehunter wrote: »

Some of you are not living in the real world.

TBH the day that there is this lack of compassion from Gradai it will be a sad day for Ireland.

What do you mean?

kerry4sam · 30-11-2012 12:51AM

applehunter wrote: »

Some of you are not living in the real world.

TBH the day that there is this lack of compassion from Gradai it will be a sad day for Ireland.

Have you worked with members of An Garda Síochána before? Do you know how much compassion members have? How much they value all full-timers and Garda Reserves? How important ethics, professionalism, honesty and team-work is present within An Garda Síochána?
Have you actually worked with members of An Garda Síochána before?

I'm just curious where your statement is coming from.

steddyeddy · 30-11-2012 12:55AM

kerry4sam wrote: »

Have you worked with members of An Garda Síochána before? Do you know how much compassion members have? How much they value all full-timers and Garda Reserves? How important ethics, professionalism, honesty and team-work is present within An Garda Síochána?
Have you actually worked with members of An Garda Síochána before?

I'm just curious where your statement is coming from.

Compassion for the safety of society should supercede those in bold.

kerry4sam · 30-11-2012 01:01AM

WileyCoyote wrote: »

What would you expect when they have at least one sexual abuser with two seperate convictions serving in their ranks!
No wonder we have such an appalling record in prosecuting for sexual offences!

steddyeddy wrote: »

I know for a fact they have worse than that in the ranks.

Would you care to elaborate steddyeddy? Who or what do you know is far worse than a sex offender within the ranks of An Garda Síochána considering the work and trust involved?

Pat Mustard · 30-11-2012 01:31AM

First, a number of people on this thread have suggested that quashing penalty points could have contributed to fatalities in Ireland.

In that regard, let's take a look at some figures from the RSA website, showing stats valid to October 2012. Hit the middle tab labelled 'penalty points incurred per driver'. Look at the bottom right hand corner of the chart.

There are a total of 816,842 drivers with penalty points.

However, there are only 132 drivers with 12 points, only 102 drivers with 11 points, 892 drivers with 10 points, 353 with 9 penalty points, 3913 with 8 points, and 740 with 7 points.

The vast majority of drivers with penalty points have 2 penalty points. That is 605,824 of 816,842 drivers with penalty points only have two points.

Getting back to the issue of the nine drivers who had penalty points quashed and were involved in fatal accidents, the chances are remote that they would otherwise have acquired 12 penalty points and become banned from driving. The figures don't support the assertion.

Secondly, many posters on this thread seem to have overlooked the fact that penalty points can be quashed validly and legally. For example, if a vehicle changes hands but the ownership details are not registered in the new owner's name, then the previous owner might receive a fixed charge notice from a speed trap. It is only fair that those points would be quashed, in such an instance.

steddyeddy · 30-11-2012 01:34AM

kerry4sam wrote: »

Would you care to elaborate steddyeddy? Who or what do you know is far worse than a sex offender within the ranks of An Garda Síochána considering the work and trust involved?

I've been blabbing on about it for post after post to be honest. I know people who told gaurds that they were being abused and ignored. Myself included. Some of those have commited suicide since. The most famous being the Brendan smyth case. The mother of the victim of smyths aproached the gaurds about the abuse. After a week or two the woman went to the gaurds about prosecution of the priest or to stop him abusing others. The gaurds lost the file (deliberatly lost it if I factor out bs). The kid commit suicide a week later. The first of many who did over abuse and gaurd cooperation in this country. According to Newsnight the second in charge of the gaurds was who the victim of smyth reported to and lost the file.

Myself I wasnt sexually abused but subject to extreme physical abuse. I told the gaurds at twelve. They said theyd get back to me and didnt (they were going to use a pay phone to avoid calling the house). I went to the gaurds and one in particular gave out to me for bothering him. I went back again and they called my father or abuser if you prefer and said I was "making up abuse claims". At the time I had a burn mark on my leg from boiling water being poured on it and a broken toe from being hit with a hammer Both injuries which were shown to the gaurds. Which you can imagine made things worse until I found a patron who got me out of the country. I got education abroad and came back home for a bit. Im lucky I have since met other people, kids who were let down by the gaurds.

Sorry for the long post. Im not looking for sympathy as I am now doing what is my lifes dream ie scientific research but lucky or otherwise I havent recieved one apology from the gaurds over what happend. No head has rolled.

I realise not all gaurds are like this, most arent. And its a tough job but no gaurd has ever went through in their job the kind of abuse they often let kids go through. If and when certain gaurds leave or get fired then I will trust the gaurds again one day but hopefully people will understand that iIm am not going to trust automatically.

Pat Mustard · 30-11-2012 01:42AM

Guards.

Death and Taxes · 30-11-2012 09:02AM

http://www.irishtimes.com/newspaper/ireland/2012/1130/1224327301104.html
A high-profile GAA figure has had points terminated four times, three times this year, including two offences recorded in a three-day period.

A judge at the centre of the controversy around the termination of penalty points had points terminated three times. Records seen by The Irish Times show the judge’s car was recorded speeding two days in succession in April 2010 and in May 2012.

Once the judge’s car was recorded driving at twice the legal speed limit – 101km/h in a 50km/h zone. The next day the car was detected travelling at 90km/h in the same location.

On another occasion the car was detected doing 74km/h in a 60km/h zone.

A former Fine Gael councillor has also had points terminated, as has a man who has played rugby for Ireland. The RTÉ figure and the man who has played rugby for Ireland were both recorded doing 150km/h in a 120km/h.

Totally indefensible!:mad:

Death and Taxes · 30-11-2012 10:31AM

applehunter wrote: »

Some of you are not living in the real world.

TBH the day that there is this lack of compassion from Gradai it will be a sad day for Ireland.

Compassion is one thing, cancelling a Judges penalty points after he/she was caught twice in as many days is another, as is cancelling a GAA heads 4, yes 4 times in one year (he was obviously rushing to an emergency match on each occassion!)

Cienciano · 30-11-2012 10:57AM

Jasus, the whole "garda can do no wrong" brigade is fairly strong.

Death and Taxes · 30-11-2012 11:07AM

Cienciano wrote: »

Jasus, the whole "garda can do no wrong" brigade is fairly strong.

Yup, they is! They sure is!

jasonmcco · 30-11-2012 01:15PM

steddyeddy wrote: »

Well he certainly wont make any friends for himself within the gaurds.

Exactly he will be ostracised for doing the right thing.

Will he even keep his job i wonder?
I bet they sack him.

Death and Taxes · 30-11-2012 01:17PM

jasonmcco wrote: »

Exactly he will be ostracised for doing the right thing.

Will he even keep his job i wonder?
I bet they sack him.

I doubt they will sack him, it will just be the end of his career promotion wise.
I mean they dont even sack serial sex offenders in their ranks.

jasonmcco · 30-11-2012 01:21PM

steddyeddy wrote: »

There have been several instances by a few posters of posts making out that anyone who has a problem with certain gaurds actions have been a thinly vieled hatred of the whole organisation. Several people on boards cleary have a problem with the gaurds in general or even the idea of a police force but if someone has a problem with elements in the gaurds or the orginizations tolerence for those elements that doesnt mean all of us would tar the institurion with the same brush. In reality wanting some bad members of the force out is suppprting the gaurds as a whole. Frank Serpico loved the police force and yet he helped route out corruption. The two attitudes arent incompatible.

Alot of people seem to have a problem your right and yet you still don't dare to ask why.Maybe you believe that guards deserve respect while some of us believe they should earn it. Read the Murphy report to get a proper feel for garda position in irish society.

jasonmcco · 30-11-2012 01:25PM

WileyCoyote wrote: »

I doubt they will sack him, it will just be the end of his career promotion wise..
I mean they dont even sack serial sex offenders in their ranks.

I remember a guy working in Harcourt terrace station was caught with child porn and judge let him off with no conviction which means he doesn't even go on the sex register.

We live in a very corrupt society where people with money can pay the justice system to dodge being punished for sex crimes they are convicted of.

MagicSean · 30-11-2012 01:26PM

jasonmcco wrote: »

Exactly he will be ostracised for doing the right thing.

Will he even keep his job i wonder?
I bet they sack him.

The problem with what he did is that he didn't look for cases where things were dodgy. He just lumped in the good with the bad. There are plenty of legitimate reasons for a ticket to be cancelled and this will be the case in most of the 50,000 he has referenced.

WileyCoyote wrote: »

I doubt they will sack him, it will just be the end of his career promotion wise.
I mean they dont even sack serial sex offenders in their ranks.

Is he still in the job or are you assuming it just because you haven't been told otherwise?

keithclancy · 30-11-2012 01:31PM

After living in The Netherlands and Germany, I find the Gardai quite approachable.

You have a lot of freedoms in Ireland that you take for granted, plus the cops don't carry guns.

Theres a fine line between effective policing and shooting/kicking the shít out of someone.

The Police in the Netherlands have a very bad rep from what I can gather.

I went to make a Police report before as my car had been broken into, basically they said "What do you want us to do, fingerprint it, lol .."
When I explained that I needed it for my insurance I was accused of pulling some sort of scam.

After a while they said fine, didn't even bother looking at the car and wrote everything down.

Another night we were sitting in the Neighbours garden having a beer, other Neighbour had just gotten back from france, he parked up and an unmarked car pulled up behind him. They had been following him for the last 10 kilometers since one of his rear lights was out. They tried to write a ticket for every Garage he passed :rolleyes:

In Germany (it depends on the area/region) they have a softly softly approach similar to the Gardai. However in Germany when it kicks off they go in hard.

I was sitting outside a hotel in Cologne, there was some sort of rally going on, a few cops turned up, then something happened and 25 riot vans turned up, around 300 cops on standby in Cologne the whole time.

Also, in both countries the Fines make Irish look like a pretty good deal, if you break a red light in Germany, over 1.5 seconds your looking at a 900 euro fine and 3 months off the road.

jasonmcco · 30-11-2012 01:43PM

steddyeddy wrote: »

I've been blabbing on about it for post after post to be honest. I know people who told gaurds that they were being abused and ignored. Myself included. Some of those have commited suicide since. The most famous being the Brendan smyth case. The mother of the victim of smyths aproached the gaurds about the abuse. After a week or two the woman went to the gaurds about prosecution of the priest or to stop him abusing others. The gaurds lost the file (deliberatly lost it if I factor out bs). The kid commit suicide a week later. The first of many who did over abuse and gaurd cooperation in this country. According to Newsnight the second in charge of the gaurds was who the victim of smyth reported to and lost the file.

Myself I wasnt sexually abused but subject to extreme physical abuse. I told the gaurds at twelve. They said theyd get back to me and didnt (they were going to use a pay phone to avoid calling the house). I went to the gaurds and one in particular gave out to me for bothering him. I went back again and they called my father or abuser if you prefer and said I was "making up abuse claims". At the time I had a burn mark on my leg from boiling water being poured on it and a broken toe from being hit with a hammer Both injuries which were shown to the gaurds. Which you can imagine made things worse until I found a patron who got me out of the country. I got education abroad and came back home for a bit. Im lucky I have since met other people, kids who were let down by the gaurds.

Sorry for the long post. Im not looking for sympathy as I am now doing what is my lifes dream ie scientific research but lucky or otherwise I havent recieved one apology from the gaurds over what happend. No head has rolled.

I realise not all gaurds are like this, most arent. And its a tough job but no gaurd has ever went through in their job the kind of abuse they often let kids go through. If and when certain gaurds leave or get fired then I will trust the gaurds again one day but hopefully people will understand that iIm am not going to trust automatically.

Fair play to you mate for posting.

The very people you will find defending the gaurds here are probably the same type of people who are still defending the church in ireland.

I also know a girl who reported being sexually abused by her father to a guard and the guard did nothing and told her she was a trouble maker.
My friend killed herself 4 yrs ago but hey don't criticise the gaurds.

kerry4sam · 30-11-2012 01:53PM

WileyCoyote wrote: »

I doubt they will sack him, it will just be the end of his career promotion wise.
I mean they dont even sack serial sex offenders in their ranks.

MagicSean wrote: »

The problem with what he did is that he didn't look for cases where things were dodgy. He just lumped in the good with the bad. There are plenty of legitimate reasons for a ticket to be cancelled and this will be the case in most of the 50,000 he has referenced.

Is he still in the job or are you assuming it just because you haven't been told otherwise?

I was just going to ask this question myself.

Death and Taxes · 30-11-2012 02:07PM

MagicSean wrote: »

The problem with what he did is that he didn't look for cases where things were dodgy. He just lumped in the good with the bad. There are plenty of legitimate reasons for a ticket to be cancelled and this will be the case in most of the 50,000 he has referenced.

Is he still in the job or are you assuming it just because you haven't been told otherwise?

My information is that he is still a member, happy to retract that if you can show otherwise, Sargent Marta "Fists" McEnrey, also remains a member.

Re the first part of your post I think you should read the report in todays Irish Times (link posted earlier) and then question how a Gaa member could get four tickets quashed this year so far, how a judge driving at twice the speed limit could get their tickets quashed, two tickets in two days in the same area FFS.

If something is wrong, lets say it is wrong and look at ways of dealing with it, instead of trying to trivialize it.

By the way would interfering with fixed penalty notices without proper authority and reason not be perverting the course of justice, both for those who request it and those who do it?

MagicSean · 30-11-2012 02:47PM

WileyCoyote wrote: »

My information is that he is still a member, happy to retract that if you can show otherwise, Sargent Marta "Fists" McEnrey, also remains a member.

If he is I'd imagine he's awaiting a disciplinary hearing.

WileyCoyote wrote: »

Re the first part of your post I think you should read the report in todays Irish Times (link posted earlier) and then question how a Gaa member could get four tickets quashed this year so far, how a judge driving at twice the speed limit could get their tickets quashed, two tickets in two days in the same area FFS.

If something is wrong, lets say it is wrong and look at ways of dealing with it, instead of trying to trivialize it.

By the way would interfering with fixed penalty notices without proper authority and reason not be perverting the course of justice, both for those who request it and those who do it?

I'm not trying to trivialize anything. There may be well be some cases that will cross a line in ethics or even the law. But the vast majority of those he has put in the spotlight will not be in any way dodgy and it's a shame they will all get tarred with the same brush.

kerry4sam · 30-11-2012 03:25PM

WileyCoyote wrote: »

My information is that he is still a member, happy to retract that if you can show otherwise, Sargent Marta "Fists" McEnrey, also remains a member.

...

MagicSean wrote: »

If he is I'd imagine he's awaiting a disciplinary hearing.
...

re: Sergeant convicted of Sexual Assault:- If they are still a serving member, would their be a possibility that he is still working the front-line meeting and 'assisting' people who would be classified as vulnerable?

Dr Turk Turkelton · 30-11-2012 03:34PM

WileyCoyote wrote: »

My information is that he is still a member, happy to retract that if you can show otherwise, Sargent Marta "Fists" McEnrey, also remains a member.

Re the first part of your post I think you should read the report in todays Irish Times (link posted earlier) and then question how a Gaa member could get four tickets quashed this year so far, how a judge driving at twice the speed limit could get their tickets quashed, two tickets in two days in the same area FFS.

If something is wrong, lets say it is wrong and look at ways of dealing with it, instead of trying to trivialize it.

By the way would interfering with fixed penalty notices without proper authority and reason not be perverting the course of justice, both for those who request it and those who do it?

Lol "fists"-I love it!

To be fair though reading about her case at the time she did seem to have a lot of psychotic tendencies.

Also was she not convicted?and if I recall correctly it was another Guard who reported them?

Fair play to the Guard that did this it must have been hard to do against fellow Gardai but it does show him up as a member of the force who people would trust.

steddyeddy · 30-11-2012 04:07PM

MagicSean wrote: »

If he is I'd imagine he's awaiting a disciplinary hearing.

I'm not trying to trivialize anything. There may be well be some cases that will cross a line in ethics or even the law. But the vast majority of those he has put in the spotlight will not be in any way dodgy and it's a shame they will all get tarred with the same brush.

I certainly dont think all gaurds are bad and wouldnt tar all with the actions of a few.

serfboard · 30-11-2012 05:58PM

WileyCoyote wrote: »

Two seperate victims , seperate cases heard in the same week, you try reading the article again.
It is his employer who is allowing him to keep his job, he has been convicted on two seperate occassions of sexually assaulting to seperate victims and is still serving in AGS. Says a lot about what AGS really think about sexual assault!
Nice to see somebody defending serial sexual abuse inside AGS though, well done poster!:mad:

No, you try reading the article again. The judge says he was going to lose his job - how do you know he hasn't?

MagicSean wrote: »

Is he still in the job or are you assuming it just because you haven't been told otherwise?

WileyCoyote wrote: »

My information is that he is still a member, happy to retract that if you can show otherwise

No, you're the one alleging that he's still in the job, so it's up to you to substantiate that claim. You haven't so far - you just expect us to believe you.

WileyCoyote wrote: »

http://www.irishtimes.com/newspaper/ireland/2012/1130/1224327301104.html
A high-profile GAA figure has had points terminated four times, three times this year, including two offences recorded in a three-day period.

A judge at the centre of the controversy around the termination of penalty points had points terminated three times. Records seen by The Irish Times show the judge’s car was recorded speeding two days in succession in April 2010 and in May 2012.

Once the judge’s car was recorded driving at twice the legal speed limit – 101km/h in a 50km/h zone. The next day the car was detected travelling at 90km/h in the same location.

On another occasion the car was detected doing 74km/h in a 60km/h zone.

A former Fine Gael councillor has also had points terminated, as has a man who has played rugby for Ireland. The RTÉ figure and the man who has played rugby for Ireland were both recorded doing 150km/h in a 120km/h.

Totally indefensible!:mad:

Agreed. Nobody would defend that - and I don't. I wouldn't defend bad behaviour in the Gardaí like I wouldn't defend unsubstantiated allegations like yours.

Death and Taxes · 30-11-2012 07:27PM

serfboard wrote: »

No, you try reading the article again. The judge says he was going to lose his job - how do you know he hasn't?

No, you're the one alleging that he's still in the job, so it's up to you to substantiate that claim. You haven't so far - you just expect us to believe you.

Agreed. Nobody would defend that - and I don't. I wouldn't defend bad behaviour in the Gardaí like I wouldn't defend unsubstantiated allegations like yours.

I didnt make a single allegation, I merely quoted cases that have come before the courts.
Sargeant Woods (the serial sex abuser) is still a member of AGS or at least was at 4 o'clock today, I know, I checked.
Martha "Fists" McEnrey is still a member of AGS despite recently losing her appeal aagainst her conviction, her arguement , which was rejected by the CCA, being that if the Jury had been told by the Judge that the arrest was lawful then ANY force used had to be justified.
All the other cases I mentioned can easily be googled.
try some basic research before shooting off another ill thought out reply.

Going Forward · 04-12-2012 10:58PM

These allegations are not at all surprising.

I am personally aware of 3 completely separate cases where relations of local members of the Gardai have had cases against them deliberately fiddled.

One case involved an individual who was charged with drink driving, but his Garda brother scuppered that case by mislaying some paperwork, (the other drunk drivers also caught at that same checkpoint naturally had no such issues with their paperwork), another involved a pedestrian being knocked down by the son of a Garda, and the third case relates to special treatment given to the relations of the local superintendent.

These blatant incidents all occurred in one small area.

In her interview today with Matt Cooper she mentioned something about the Garda Ombudsmans Office, not sure but it sounded as if she was saying that members of that office had points wiped too?

Spill the beans Ming and Clare.

Going Forward · 04-12-2012 11:32PM

tim_sims wrote: »

i had an uncle in law who made inspector and an uncle who was a rank and file

i remember about twenty years ago , my father got done for no motor tax , he rang his brother who in turn rang the station in our area , charges were duly dropped

this type of thing has been going on for years and anyone who thinks otherwise is a little naive

Handy to have a family member in the force alright. Pity we couldnt have got a couple of ours to join up.

repsol · 04-12-2012 11:54PM

WileyCoyote wrote: »

My information is that he is still a member, happy to retract that if you can show otherwise, Sargent Marta "Fists" McEnrey, also remains a member.

Re the first part of your post I think you should read the report in todays Irish Times (link posted earlier) and then question how a Gaa member could get four tickets quashed this year so far, how a judge driving at twice the speed limit could get their tickets quashed, two tickets in two days in the same area FFS.

If something is wrong, lets say it is wrong and look at ways of dealing with it, instead of trying to trivialize it.

By the way would interfering with fixed penalty notices without proper authority and reason not be perverting the course of justice, both for those who request it and those who do it?

I would have thought your woman "fists":D would have been sacked automatically from the force.How come she is still employed? Is it just a matter of due process and will happen eventually or has she got away with it?:mad:

hatrickpatrick · 05-12-2012 01:31AM

Endemic cronyism in Irish society. Is anyone honestly surprised?

Garda wiped driving slate for two judges and RTE presenter

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