Oireachtas Joint and Select Committees

Wednesday, 12 February 2014

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Public Service Oversight and Petitions

Security and Protocol Issues: Garda Síochána Ombudsman Commission

7:05 pm

Mr. Simon O'Brien:

As I have said before, the business of surveillance is imprecise. It is very difficult, if it has been conducted successfully, to know it has been done. We were left with several suspicious activities which we investigated. In some of our investigations we left assets in place untouched and examined them; in others, we repeated tests to see if they would be repeated. In the final test, when we tried to find some form of linkage between a couple of the threats, again we did not have anything coming back. We got to a certain place where we were operating with a lack of proper communication. It was right and proportionate to do what we did and to get out when we did.

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