WIFE OF OMAGH ACCUSED LIED TO POLICE
Wife of Omagh accused lied to police
THE wife of a man being sued for the Omagh bombing lied to police questioning her about phone contact the pair had less than an hour after the explosion, the High Court heard yesterday.
Catherine McKenna, whose estranged husband Seamus is among five men named in the multi-million-pound civil action, at first claimed to have been in Galway on August 15, 1998, the day of the Real IRA atrocity which killed 29 people including a woman pregnant with twins.
She gave the false whereabouts to detectives who told her they suspected that a mobile phone which had been used to call her home in south Armagh was in the car that took the explosives to Omagh, a police witness confirmed.
Mrs McKenna, arrested in March 1999 on suspicion of withholding information connected to the bombing, was taken away by helicopter in front of her "screaming and crying" children, the court was told.
Transcripts from her interviews with John Gilmore, then a detective sergeant, were read out on day seven of the case in Belfast brought by the families of some of the victims against McKenna, Real IRA leader Michael McKevitt, Liam Campbell, Colm Murphy and Seamus Daly.
In one section she recalled McKenna making the call at 3.41pm. She could give no explanation for the contact but told police it was not to speak about the attack on Omagh.
The court heard how, during questioning, Mrs McKenna described her husband as sober at the time, not "full-steam, out of his mind".
At another point she claimed to be in the Republic that day.
Mr Gilmore told the court: "It transpired she had been telling lies. She hadn't been in Galway on August 15."
Cross-examined by Brian Fee QC, for McKenna, Mr Gilmore disagreed with the barrister's claim that Mrs McKenna was inconsistent and unreliable about the phone call.
But Mr Fee insisted: "It was abundantly clear from the outset of your interviewing of her that she was an extremely suggestible lady. If you said something to her, her natural inclination was to try and agree with it."
Mr Fee claimed Mrs McKenna had been so frightened during questioning that she could not stop her hands shaking long enough to sign forms.
But Mr Gilmore told him: "All I wanted out of this lady was the truth - what she knew in relation to receiving this phone call."
Earlier the court heard police interviews with Danny Hughes, a Dundalk man suspected of giving telephone bomb warnings, about three calls he made to a mobile phone belonging to Liam Campbell hours after the Omagh massacre.
Hughes, now dead, told detectives he knew Campbell from playing Gaelic football with him and described him as a wheeler-dealer type.
In the transcripts read out in court a detective asked him whether he had tried to get in contact with Campbell after news came out that the bomb had gone wrong.
Hughes denied this and claimed he had been unable to get through on his phone.
With telephone evidence dominating the second week of the trial, another detective revealed that five million calls had been sifted through in the aftermath of the bombing.
That led to series of arrests on both sides of the border after 22 interrelated numbers were identified. All but four of them were being used by people living in the Republic.
The trial continues.
THE wife of a man being sued for the Omagh bombing lied to police questioning her about phone contact the pair had less than an hour after the explosion, the High Court heard yesterday.
Catherine McKenna, whose estranged husband Seamus is among five men named in the multi-million-pound civil action, at first claimed to have been in Galway on August 15, 1998, the day of the Real IRA atrocity which killed 29 people including a woman pregnant with twins.
She gave the false whereabouts to detectives who told her they suspected that a mobile phone which had been used to call her home in south Armagh was in the car that took the explosives to Omagh, a police witness confirmed.
Mrs McKenna, arrested in March 1999 on suspicion of withholding information connected to the bombing, was taken away by helicopter in front of her "screaming and crying" children, the court was told.
Transcripts from her interviews with John Gilmore, then a detective sergeant, were read out on day seven of the case in Belfast brought by the families of some of the victims against McKenna, Real IRA leader Michael McKevitt, Liam Campbell, Colm Murphy and Seamus Daly.
In one section she recalled McKenna making the call at 3.41pm. She could give no explanation for the contact but told police it was not to speak about the attack on Omagh.
The court heard how, during questioning, Mrs McKenna described her husband as sober at the time, not "full-steam, out of his mind".
At another point she claimed to be in the Republic that day.
Mr Gilmore told the court: "It transpired she had been telling lies. She hadn't been in Galway on August 15."
Cross-examined by Brian Fee QC, for McKenna, Mr Gilmore disagreed with the barrister's claim that Mrs McKenna was inconsistent and unreliable about the phone call.
But Mr Fee insisted: "It was abundantly clear from the outset of your interviewing of her that she was an extremely suggestible lady. If you said something to her, her natural inclination was to try and agree with it."
Mr Fee claimed Mrs McKenna had been so frightened during questioning that she could not stop her hands shaking long enough to sign forms.
But Mr Gilmore told him: "All I wanted out of this lady was the truth - what she knew in relation to receiving this phone call."
Earlier the court heard police interviews with Danny Hughes, a Dundalk man suspected of giving telephone bomb warnings, about three calls he made to a mobile phone belonging to Liam Campbell hours after the Omagh massacre.
Hughes, now dead, told detectives he knew Campbell from playing Gaelic football with him and described him as a wheeler-dealer type.
In the transcripts read out in court a detective asked him whether he had tried to get in contact with Campbell after news came out that the bomb had gone wrong.
Hughes denied this and claimed he had been unable to get through on his phone.
With telephone evidence dominating the second week of the trial, another detective revealed that five million calls had been sifted through in the aftermath of the bombing.
That led to series of arrests on both sides of the border after 22 interrelated numbers were identified. All but four of them were being used by people living in the Republic.
The trial continues.
Further Information
Publisher: THE IRISH NEWS
Ref: IN/0921
Published Date: 17-Apr-08
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