Witness denies lying to Morris Tribunal
An illiterate Sligo man today today denied lying to the Morris Tribunal about a series of bizarre letters.
Bernard Conlon, 49, from Cartron Bay, said he had come to the hearing to tell the truth about the trickery he had been up to.
“I came here to help the chairman and the barristers as much as I can. I came here every single day until I’m told to go,” he said.
Mr Conlon has told the tribunal’s Silver Bullet module that he made up the allegations about being threatened with death by a bullet by members of the extended McBrearty family at his home in Sligo in 1998.
Senior Counsel Peter Charleton, representing the tribunal, asked him about the 1998 letter he had received from private investigator Billy Flynn, who had been hired by the McBrearty family.
Mr Conlon said he gave the one-page letter to Detective Sergeant John White, who he has blamed for putting him up to making the false death threats.
“I asked Sergeant White did he know Billy Flynn and he said: ‘I know the hoor. He made phone calls to my wife.’”
Mr Conlon said that when the letter was later returned to him there were two typed pages in it rather than one. The almost incomprehensible second page contained two paragraphs, claiming that ‘Frank McBertie’ (presumably Frank McBrearty) would be asked for money and was signed ‘Bernard’.
Mr Charleton put it to Mr Conlon that the phrasing of the second page of the letter and the reference to ‘Frank McBertie’ were similar to letters he got friends to write on his behalf to former Garda Commissioner Pat Byrne and Minister for Justice Michael McDowell.
“It seems these startling similarities couldn’t fall out of the sky,” he said.
“I certainly didn’t get letters typed. On my mother’s dead grave, and she’s almost 20 years gone from me, I certainly didn’t,” said Mr Conlon.
Sgt White has denied that he had any involvement in the writing of the second page of the Flynn letter.
Mr Conlon is the key witness in the Silver Bullet module, which is due to conclude within the next week.
He said he had come clean about his activities when he was arrested by the Carty team in January 2000 and taken to Manorhamilton Garda Station in Leitrim.
“I told them my memory of what went on and what trickery I was up to, gallivanting in patrol cars. I was in a cold cell locked up. I had no other option,” he said.
Mr Conlon described the members of the internal Garda inquiry as serious men.
“They weren’t like ordinary guards. They didn’t want to hear sh*t in other words. They were there to hear the truth,” he said.
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