One garda fined €5.7k for beIng drunk on duty among 57 found to have breached discipline last year
One member of the Garda Siochána was last year fined €5,750 for being drunk on duty.
The €5,750 fine on the member was also for a sanction of one count of ‘discreditable conduct’ and ‘drinking on duty’.
In total, 57 members were found to be in breach of Garda internal discipline last year and a total of €22,000 was imposed in fines.
Garda management also imposed fines ranging from one week's reduction in pay to 11 weeks and five days reduction in pay and "a monetary figure cannot be determined for these fines".
The figures show that one member was dismissed last year for breach of Garda discipline regulations.
The Garda member who had the highest monetary penalty of 11 weeks and five days pay docked was for a sanction of 15 separate counts of 'neglect of duty'.
The bulk of the disciplinary sanctions were for neglect of duty by Garda members while there was also three instances of falsehood/prevarication. The FOI does not disclose the rank of the Garda members concerned.
One other Garda received a fine of €900 for nine separate count of 'neglect of duty' while two other Gardai were each docked one week’s pay for one count of discreditable conduct.
Where the Gardaí made findings in relation to members being docked weeks or days pay, this was the finding of the board of inquiry/appeal board as recorded at Internal Affairs.
The FOI response also said that the minor discplinary matters are addressed locally and such records are not held centrally.
The FOI response also confirmed that the number of gardaí suspended from duty last year totalled 21.
The FOI unit advised “that some of the members remain on suspension and others had their suspension lifted within 2019”.
The unit stated: “Due to the small number of members currently suspended, I am withholding the rank and the reasons for suspension of the members concerned.”
The decision maker added: “I am conscious of my obligation to retain personal information in a confidential and secure manner and prevent personal information from being released into the public domain unnecessarily."
The decision maker also refused to reveal details of rank and reasons for suspension “as I believe that the individuals involved will all become easily identifiable beyond their family and friends and it would be considered a breach of the confidentiality upon which the information is being held by the Garda organisation.”
