Dermot Ahern (Louth, Fianna Fail)

-----but what the surveillance legislation will do is lessen, in certain but not all circumstances, the necessity for civilian witnesses to be brought forward. We can never say we will be able to prove any case beyond a reasonable doubt in any court, whether a jury or non-jury case, if we do not have the required evidence and standard of proof. Normally, that is done by people giving evidence as to what they saw on a particular occasion. There is no doubt there is a new fear of intimidation, particularly in such geographic areas as Finglas and Limerick.

The Deputy asked for a case demonstrating intimidation. Cases have been brought to my attention by the Garda where jurors have been interfered with and these are cases involving gangland crime. There is one such case already on record. The Deputy obviously did not hear Michael Murray on RTE when he said, "They started intimidating witnesses, they made life uncomfortable for jurors". He went on to speak about his own experience. He said that in the recent past he had certainly one case where he was very concerned at the level of intimidation of the jury, so much so that he made a report to the Garda authorities and asked them to investigate the matter where a person was acquitted in circumstances where it was clear to him that the jury was afraid. That is one case, and I am aware of other cases where people were interfered with.

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