Garda Ombudsman offices bugged

Santa Cruz · 14-02-2014 11:42AM

Femme_Fatale wrote: »

I'd have said a 70s crooner type, like Julio Iglesias.

One of those crooners who tells you he sings in Vegas but then you find out he does a couple of gigs in the afternoon to a bunch of geriatrics in the back lounge of The Happy Hooker.

aloyisious · 14-02-2014 12:15PM

I have to admire Comm Callinan in putting his job on the line, if the reported statement (to the effect that he will state that there was no authorised surveillance of GSOC by any Garda/i,,,, and there was NO unauthorised surveillance of GSOC by any Garda/i) is correct. In his position I would only go as far as the first sentence of that supposed statement.

I would only issue that first part as a statement after I had gone to the Garda Accounting and Stores officers given budgets and authority to purchase or hire electronic surveillance equipment for legally authorised operations and checked their books and records for same to see what was purchased or hired, along with checking the books and records for recording the issuing of such equipment.

I would also insist on visiting the stores where the equipment NOT out on issue to examine the stock in stores and see if all that should be there was actually there. I would also check the records of ongoing operations to see that the equipment issued for those operations was actually always on site and in use at those operations, and NOT "sub-issued or loaned" to some Garda member/s outside Garda rules and legal powers.

If there was an unauthorised Garda surveillance operation and Comm Callinan became aware of it, it would have to in tandem with him at least suspending the garda/i involved (regardless of rank) and ordering an imvestigation and reporting all of that to Mr Shatter. If I was in Comm Callinan's position, I would NOT categorically state that there was NO unauthorised Garda surveillance operation of the GSOC ever.

Mr Shatter is a good wordsmith, but if he did not ask Mr Simon O'Brien the obvious question "Did you, or the GSOC, ever suspect that the electronic surveillance operation thought to have been carried out against the GSOC was a Garda operation" then he is either an ostrich or a fool not to ask the obvious and he should be moved from MOJ office. If he deliberately did not ask the question in order to avoid the answer, it can only be seen (IMO) as a failure to uphold his office as MOJ and he must go. either by sacking or resignation.

Birroc · 14-02-2014 12:21PM

SpaceTime wrote: »

What worries me is that Ireland has a long history of this mentality of immediately trying to shut down any dissenting voices.

If we'd supported whistle blowers, we wouldn't have had practically any of the deeply damaging and horrendous scandals that happened all throughout the years.

Just look at how as a society in the past we completely ignored all the child abuse issues going on in church-run institutions because nobody would rock the boat and upset people.
The result: thousands of lives wrecked and the state having to pay vast compensation.

Did nobody notice that symphysiotomy (an absolutely barbaric and outdated practice) was being carried out in maternity hospitals here ? If they did, why couldn't they blow the whistle?

More recently, the banks were allowed to run amuck because of a similar culture where nobody could blow the whistle and the regulator and state oversight was very weak.

There are countless situations in Ireland where we simply do not face reality and prefer to pretend that there's nothing going on.

Common thread : lack of transparency and a fear of upsetting the status quo.

It absolutely has to change if we're not simply going to repeat and repeat and repeat and repeat the same mistakes over and over.

Excellent post and I full agree.
For common thread, I would add Cowardice.

I actually have always respected Shatter but now I believe he is colluding with the Gardaí to get this story shut down and to discredit the Ombudsman. I expect heads to roll on this. I think the Gardaí are a dysfunctional organisation right now and need better leadership

Phoebas · 14-02-2014 12:24PM

aloyisious wrote: »

Mr Shatter is a good wordsmith, but if he did not ask Mr Simon O'Brien the obvious question "Did you, or the GSOC, ever suspect that the electronic surveillance operation thought to have been carried out against the GSOC was a Garda operation" then he is either an ostrich or a fool not to ask the obvious and he should be moved from MOJ office. If he deliberately did not ask the question in order to avoid the answer, it can only be seen (IMO) as a failure to uphold his office as MOJ and he must go. either by sacking or resignation.

GSOC have made it quite clear in their briefing note to the Minister that they did have that suspicion and that was the basis of them launching a public interest investigation under section 102(4) of the Garda Siochana Act.

It was the conclusion of that investigation that no 'definitive' evidence of surveillance was found and that no further action was necessary or reasonably practicable.

Banjo String · 14-02-2014 12:31PM

Happyman42 wrote: »

You may have a point.

I had parker in mind.

Uncanny.

ygolometsipe · 14-02-2014 01:12PM

aloyisious wrote: »

I have to admire Comm Callinan in putting his job on the line, ..........to uphold his office as MOJ and he must go. either by sacking or resignation.

It is very strange that he said no bugging at all with out doing any of that first?
Or maybe he did it super fast.
Or maybe there is no point in looking for something if you already know where it is.

aloyisious · 14-02-2014 01:38PM

Phoebas wrote: »

GSOC have made it quite clear in their briefing note to the Minister that they did have that suspicion and that was the basis of them launching a public interest investigation under section 102(4) of the Garda Siochana Act.

It was the conclusion of that investigation that no 'definitive' evidence of surveillance was found and that no further action was necessary or reasonably practicable.

Clearly he "misunderstood" what was said/put in print in the report. He is a politician used to "Leinster-House" speak :rolleyes:

hatrickpatrick · 14-02-2014 01:40PM

I think one thing should be becoming obvious here - even if they suspected they were being bugged, it should now be wholly apparent why they didn't want to tell anyone without absolute concrete evidence.
Apparently even the merest suggestion that some Gardai could be engaged in criminality causes the most almighty political sh!tstorm in which those who made the suggestion face a vicious assault from those in power and to a certain extent from the media.

Coupled with the alleged transcript of the whistleblower's conversation with the confidential recipient, this paints a fairly bleak picture of what happens in Ireland when anyone dares to question the notion that those at the top of the establishment have wings and halos. :mad:

Phoebas · 14-02-2014 01:44PM

aloyisious wrote: »

Clearly he "misunderstood" what was said/put in print in the report. He is a politician used to "Leinster-House" speak :rolleyes:

The briefing note was written by GSOC, not a politician.

aloyisious · 14-02-2014 02:10PM

The latest "briefing" to the media by the Minister and the Comm is really tea-spluttering, total confidence etc, LOL, speak-talk for "you're for the chop, mister".

dxhound2005 · 14-02-2014 02:43PM

hatrickpatrick wrote: »

I think one thing should be becoming obvious here - even if they suspected they were being bugged, it should now be wholly apparent why they didn't want to tell anyone without absolute concrete evidence.
Apparently even the merest suggestion that some Gardai could be engaged in criminality causes the most almighty political sh!tstorm in which those who made the suggestion face a vicious assault from those in power and to a certain extent from the media.

Coupled with the alleged transcript of the whistleblower's conversation with the confidential recipient, this paints a fairly bleak picture of what happens in Ireland when anyone dares to question the notion that those at the top of the establishment have wings and halos. :mad:

It turned out to be a bit pointless trying to conceal everything from the Gardai and the Minister when their building is leaking like a sieve. The media are the very ones that are inducing people into making these leaks so why would they subject one of their colleagues to a vicious assault?

The other media are remarkably quiet in the face of evidence that a dodgy organisation, News International, appear to be repeating the tactics here which currently have their top editorial brass before the courts in the UK. And since they have employed espionage techniques over there or hired "private investigators" to do so, it's possible they are doing the same here.

Santa Cruz · 14-02-2014 02:55PM

The GSOC brought in the British enquiry team because they believed information was being leaked as a result of material reaching the media.

If information is being leaked to the media about GSOC investigations it can only come from two sources.

1. Staff member of GSOC feeding the media
2. Monitoring (polite name for bugging) of communications via phones, emails.

I cannot see why the Garda should be the only suspect. The Coulson enquiry in the UK showed what Murdochs crew were up to.
If the Irish media are so anxious to find out who the buggers are why don't they get their colleagues to disclose their sources and put the whole thing at rest instead of making a John Le Carre novel out of it.

Shady Tady · 14-02-2014 04:12PM

Santa Cruz wrote: »

The GSOC brought in the British enquiry team because they believed information was being leaked as a result of material reaching the media.

If information is being leaked to the media about GSOC investigations it can only come from two sources.

1. Staff member of GSOC feeding the media
2. Monitoring (polite name for bugging) of communications via phones, emails.

I cannot see why the Garda should be the only suspect. The Coulson enquiry in the UK showed what Murdochs crew were up to.
If the Irish media are so anxious to find out who the buggers are why don't they get their colleagues to disclose their sources and put the whole thing at rest instead of making a John Le Carre novel out of it.

I'd say GSOC is a great place to work at the moment and into the future unless this leak is found! I'll be surprised if simon o brien is in place this time next week, shatter will hunt him out!

profit_hunter · 14-02-2014 04:19PM

SpaceTime wrote: »

What worries me is that Ireland has a long history of this mentality of immediately trying to shut down any dissenting voices.

If we'd supported whistle blowers, we wouldn't have had practically any of the deeply damaging and horrendous scandals that happened all throughout the years.

Just look at how as a society in the past we completely ignored all the child abuse issues going on in church-run institutions because nobody would rock the boat and upset people.
The result: thousands of lives wrecked and the state having to pay vast compensation.

Did nobody notice that symphysiotomy (an absolutely barbaric and outdated practice) was being carried out in maternity hospitals here ? If they did, why couldn't they blow the whistle?

More recently, the banks were allowed to run amuck because of a similar culture where nobody could blow the whistle and the regulator and state oversight was very weak.

There are countless situations in Ireland where we simply do not face reality and prefer to pretend that there's nothing going on.

Common thread : lack of transparency and a fear of upsetting the status quo.

It absolutely has to change if we're not simply going to repeat and repeat and repeat and repeat the same mistakes over and over.

knowing ones place and tipping the hat to authority figures is a very irish ( and catholic ) thing

profit_hunter · 14-02-2014 04:21PM

hatrickpatrick wrote: »

I think one thing should be becoming obvious here - even if they suspected they were being bugged, it should now be wholly apparent why they didn't want to tell anyone without absolute concrete evidence.
Apparently even the merest suggestion that some Gardai could be engaged in criminality causes the most almighty political sh!tstorm in which those who made the suggestion face a vicious assault from those in power and to a certain extent from the media.

Coupled with the alleged transcript of the whistleblower's conversation with the confidential recipient, this paints a fairly bleak picture of what happens in Ireland when anyone dares to question the notion that those at the top of the establishment have wings and halos. :mad:

im actually amazed that RTE is giving so much time to this issue , RTE is incredibly pro AGS

KyussBishop · 14-02-2014 04:22PM

SpaceTime wrote: »

The 'problem' is that this is far too serious to spin.

The media and the public has a very heightened awareness of spying due to the WikiLeaks revelations over the last few years and this is going to turn into a huge issue. There's also quite a lot of support for proper, transparent regulation and an awareness of the importance of it since the banking crisis.

I would also suspect that the banking crisis has caused a lot of people to have a genuinely held mistrust of the state's ability to act impartially. There's still a *long* way to go before the state regains any kind of trust after what happened back in 2007/8 and this kind of thing is really not helping at all.

Also, if it's not dealt with you can be 100% sure it will be in our next Transparency International report and any other international ratings agency that look at that kind of thing.

By 'dealt with' I mean, investigated and the results of that investigation published. Sweeping under the carpet is not dealing with anything.

Regardless of what the facts are, the optics are now awful looking and it's going to do a lot of political damage to FG and Labour (even more so) if they continue to try to push it under the carpet.

Ya and you only have to look as far as Jonathan Sugarman, a whistleblower that the central-bank/regulators are said to have implicitly threatened him (the whistleblower) with being referred to the Gardai, if he exposed wrongdoing at the financial institution he worked at.

Only have to look that far, to see the treatment of whistleblowers in this country - and by extension, the likely treatment of institutions like GSOC, that are there to give an outlet to whistleblowers.

hatrickpatrick · 14-02-2014 05:09PM

Looks like the media backlash against the government's response to this whole business has finally begun in earnest:

http://www.irishexaminer.com/analysis/gsoc-controversy-highlights-the-joke-of-a-democratic-ireland-258710.html

http://www.irishtimes.com/news/politics/gsoc-briefing-paper-contains-more-than-shatter-dáil-statement-1.1691878

http://www.irishtimes.com/news/ireland/irish-news/official-accounts-of-breach-do-not-tally-1.1690993

Is the tide turning at last?

aloyisious · 14-02-2014 05:13PM

From the Irish Times: http://www.irishtimes.com/news/politics/gsoc-briefing-paper-contains-more-than-shatter-d%C3%A1il-statement-1.1691878

I don't know anything about the technicalities of "bugging" phones. I do wonder whether there is any significance in the unexpected 3G mobile phone or ISMI catcher item (discovery No 3 noted by the UK firm on it's second check on 19/20 Oct, No's 1 and 2 being in the Sept check). If there was surveillance of GSOC and the UK firm was noted to be the checker, then (stretching theory a bit) it might have been a good idea to have an ISMI device locally as the UK firm Reps might, if phoning, texting or inter-netting a contact in head office, using their own UK-registered smart phones as the GSOC phones were suspect.

Update: Philp Boucher-hayes on Drive-time. The ISMI device can be altered to read Irish Mobile Phones

who_ru · 14-02-2014 06:43PM

dxhound2005 wrote: »

It turned out to be a bit pointless trying to conceal everything from the Gardai and the Minister when their building is leaking like a sieve. The media are the very ones that are inducing people into making these leaks so why would they subject one of their colleagues to a vicious assault?

The other media are remarkably quiet in the face of evidence that a dodgy organisation, News International, appear to be repeating the tactics here which currently have their top editorial brass before the courts in the UK. And since they have employed espionage techniques over there or hired "private investigators" to do so, it's possible they are doing the same here.

you are delusional.

Banjo String · 14-02-2014 07:00PM

who_ru wrote: »

you are delusional.

Party line must be towed.

If the Govt made an announcement tomorrow that there was no moon in the sky, the usual suspects on these threads (shills) would be swearing that the big bright disc in the sky at night was actually the sun's little brother, or a big ball of cheese.

Shatter, Kenny, and the rest of the Govt have gotten too big for their boots, all those years in the wings of opposition, and when they got the power they were like a teenager left alone in the house for the first time mam and dad had gone to the canaries for a fortnight.
This
They're finished now imo, and if the public show support to a Govt so corrupt that they spy on an independent body tasked with 'policing the police' I really do fear for the future of this island.

profit_hunter · 14-02-2014 07:30PM

Banjo String wrote: »

Party line must be towed.

If the Govt made an announcement tomorrow that there was no moon in the sky, the usual suspects on these threads (shills) would be swearing that the big bright disc in the sky at night was actually the sun's little brother, or a big ball of cheese.

Shatter, Kenny, and the rest of the Govt have gotten too big for their boots, all those years in the wings of opposition, and when they got the power they were like a teenager left alone in the house for the first time mam and dad had gone to the canaries for a fortnight.

They're finished now imo, and if the public show support to a gift so corrupt that they spy on an independent body tasked with 'policing the police' I really do fear for the future.

never see all that much unconditional love for the government around here but the endless fellatio of AGS is usually in full view

downonthefarm · 14-02-2014 08:24PM

What do you expect from a mayo man

Claregirl · 14-02-2014 11:29PM

hatrickpatrick wrote: »

Looks like the media backlash against the government's response to this whole business has finally begun in earnest:

http://www.irishexaminer.com/analysis/gsoc-controversy-highlights-the-joke-of-a-democratic-ireland-258710.html

http://www.irishtimes.com/news/politics/gsoc-briefing-paper-contains-more-than-shatter-dáil-statement-1.1691878

http://www.irishtimes.com/news/ireland/irish-news/official-accounts-of-breach-do-not-tally-1.1690993

Is the tide turning at last?

Hopefully!!

There was a suggestion on radio earlier that this scandal is all media driven and joe public has no interest in this story - this thread alone has had more than 30,000 views that would indicate some level of interest in this story. I hope the story does not die off like the government are hoping and some good will come from it the resignation sacking of Shatter / Callinan would be a good place to start.

tayto lover · 14-02-2014 11:32PM

Claregirl wrote: »

Hopefully!!

There was a suggestion on radio earlier that this scandal is all media driven and joe public has no interest in this story - this thread alone has had more than 30,000 views that would indicate some level of interest in this story. I hope the story does not die off like the government are hoping and some good will come from it the resignation sacking of Shatter / Callinan would be a good place to start.

Callinan set himself up to be knocked down today but nobody came out to put him away.
There seems to be a lot of disgust but a big lack of the proof required.
Was hoping this would end Shatter too but loads of smoke and no fire.

Busted Flat. · 14-02-2014 11:35PM

This situation is a mirror image of the FG/LP coalition of the seventies. This is fookin progress.

tomwaterford · 14-02-2014 11:38PM

tayto lover wrote: »

Callinan set himself up to be knocked down today but nobody came out to put him away.
There seems to be a lot of disgust but a big lack of the proof required.
Was hoping this would end Shatter too but loads of smoke and no fire.

any normal country there would be calls for at least one of these two to go....not the prople who are being bugged

mickdw · 14-02-2014 11:55PM

Shafter on prime time when asked about Kenny mis quoting the law about Informing the minister came up with another section of the act or whatever that meant Kenny was in fact correct.
Was shatter correct there or was it more bluff.

strongback · 15-02-2014 01:01AM

Hopefully Shatter goes down. Because of the disaster of FF this government thinks it has the remit to do whatever it wants. They ride rough shod over anybody in their way.

15-02-2014 04:24AM

Banjo String wrote: »

Party line must be towed.

If the Govt made an announcement tomorrow that there was no moon in the sky, the usual suspects on these threads (shills) would be swearing that the big bright disc in the sky at night was actually the sun's little brother, or a big ball of cheese.

I wouldn't even call them shills for FG. I like to call them by-the-bookers. You'll see them in the thread about the girl who died because some arsehole in a pharmacy wouldn't give out an epipen without a prescription. They will always defend the status quo and tell everyone that it's for our own good, sure what do we know?

Move along now folks, nothing to see here.

JacquesDeLad · 15-02-2014 04:29AM

Did the NSA do it?

I really don't care.

I'm more worried about the prospect of yet another expensive enquiry into something no one really cares about.

Garda Ombudsman offices bugged

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