My EMail to Minister for Justice Alan Shatter re Forthcoming Cloyne Report

Report on Cloyne Diocese and forthcoming (second) Trial of Father Dan Duane
From: Rory Connor
To: alan.shatter@oireachtas.ie

Wed, 22 June, 2011 1:53:32

Alan Shatter TD
Minister for Justice, Equality and Defence

Dear Minister,
I am extremely concerned about the prospect that you may consider releasing Judge Murphy's Report on the Diocese of Cloyne before the forthcoming second trial of Father Dan Duane - which I believe is due to take place in November 2011. I strongly suspect that Judge Murphy's report will omit all mention of false allegations against priests, bishops and even against Bishop John Magee himself and that it will create a climate of hysteria in which any allegation - no matter how ill-founded - will be accepted by a jury - as happened in the case of Nora Wall in June 1999.

Nora Wall (formerly Sister Dominic) and Pablo McCabe were convicted of rape one month after the broadcast of Mary Raftery's "States of Fear" series by RTE in April/May 1999. I was told by one of Nora Wall's defence team Sean Costello (then of Frank Ward and Co Solicitors), that she was convicted in an atmosphere of hysteria created by the media and specifically by States of Fear!! Mr. Costello told me afterwards that he did not want me to quote him but I am doing so because the matter is too important. I am sure that if you speak to him that he will not deny the conversation. I should also point out that Nora Wall said the same thing to journalist Breda O'Brien. (See article in Studies review, Winter 2006 "Paul McCabe and Nora Wall: Miscarriage of Justice"
http://www.irishsalem.com/irish-controversies/the-passion-of%20nora-wall-1999/miscarriageofjustice-winter06.php )

Even the Irish Times said much the same when the Court of Criminal Appeal issued a certificate of miscarriage of justice in December 2005. The following is a quote from the Wikipedia article on Nora Wall:

An Irish Times editorial on 17 December 2005 entitled "Nora Wall" stated that: "The charges were laid at a time when allegations of the abuse of children in institutions had entered the public domain. The case was heard within a month of the broadcast by RTE of the States of fear programmes. The jury could not but have been affected, it seems, by the horrific abuse exposed in that series and by the complaints of the child victims that no-one listened to them.".[43]
(Note that Mary Raftery was writing a weekly column for the Irish Times when they published that editorial.)

It may be objected that Judge Yvonne Murphy is a more reputable character than Mary Raftery and that her report is unlikely to stir up hysteria. My own experience with her and with Government appointed commissions in general suggests otherwise.

(1) As I explained in my last letter, I told Judge Murphy that I know the identity of the renegade priest who told the UK Guardian that Bishop Magee was a member of a paedophile ring. She never returned to me on that issue.

(2) I made a submission to the Ryan Commission both individually AND as a member of an official delegation from the group "Let Our Voices Emerge" - regarding false allegations of child abuse. My own contribution concerned false allegations of child murder made against the Christian Brothers and the Sisters of Mercy by leaders of "victims" organisations. The Ryan Report contains no reference to this submission or to the allegations. However I was told by a responsible participant that the "victims" who made those claims were questioned in private session and their allegations were found to be false. The Commission then took a deliberate decision to omit them - and other similar lies. This resulted in a grotesquely distorted report in which obviously false claims are ignored but any allegation that the religious orders could not disprove, is treated as fact.

It is my strong suspicion that Judge Murphy has done something similar. If so, and if her Report is released a few weeks/months before the trial of Fr Duane, it is likely to have a similar effect i.e. a false verdict of guilty based on media hysteria generated by the Report.

In these circumstances, I ask you to ensure that the Report will not be not be released until after the court case against Fr Duane is concluded.

Yours faithfully

Rory Connor
11 Lohunda Grove
Clonsilla
Dublin 15
Home: 01 .......
MOB: 087 ........

NOTE: The points I made to the Ryan Commission re alleged child killing by the Christian Brothers and the Sisters of Mercy are summarised on the main page of my website http://www.irishsalem.com/ as follows:

Letter to Sunday Tribune re Child-Killing Allegations
is a summary of several allegations that the Christian Brothers were responsible for killing children in their care. (We are not talking about negligence here.) The allegations were made in a 4 to 5 year period beginning in 1999 (i.e. just after the broadcast of Mary Raftery's "States of Fear" series by the national broadcast company RTE in April/May of that year). Prior to the broadcast of "States of Fear", there was just one allegation of that type and it was directed at the Sisters of Mercy. I have discussed this in the essay
Sister Xavieria and "Child Killing" in Goldenbridge.
(This allegation followed RTE's broadcast of Louis Lentin's documentary "Dear Daughter" in February 1996 which made serious allegations against the Sisters of Mercy in Goldenbridge residential school.)