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A further court case involving a man who shot into the limelight after stepping off a flight from the Isle of Man at Dublin Airport in 1999 carrying a bag containing £300,000 in cash which he had collected from a Bank on the Island is set to go ahead in July.
The Circuit Criminal Court in Dublin this week refused an application by the Director of Public Prosecutions to restrict pre-trial publicity in relation to former Dublin city and county manager, George Redmond. The DPP's application was successfully resisted by media organisations including all the main national newspapers.
The 82-year-old former public servant has already been involved in earlier corruption proceedings. In July 2004, the Court of Criminal Appeal quashed Mr Redmond's conviction on separate corruption charges and did not order a retrial because he had already served eight months of two concurrent one-year sentences.
Since his Isle of Man - Dublin 'odyssey' Mr Redmond had scarcely been out of the news and his affairs, together with those of other business and public figures in Ireland, have been the subject of scrutiny by commissions of enquiry in Ireland
However, the Isle of Man government and its agencies have never given a satisfactory account of how it was that he and others were able to deposit and withdraw large sums of money from Banking institutions on the Isle of Man. At the time the Isle of Man governments financial regulations had been substantially 'beefed up' and its financial crime unit strengthened. The Police Fraud Squad became the Financial Crime Unit. In addition Banks and the Government were promoting a 'know your customer' policy.
Whilst Redmond faced (and continues to face) allegations of corruption in public life not all those from Ireland who used Manx banks were simply corrupt public figures.
Dublin's criminal underworld also used (and may still use) the Isle of Man for its 'financial business'.
In 2000 underworld figure, Kevin Meehan, was found guilty, by the Irish Special Criminal Court, of six charges of money laundering connected with criminal activity. Meehan, a man ostensibly with an income of £60 per week social welfare benefits, deposited more than £600,000 sterling in a Vienna bank. The tortuous process for the transfer of the monies included accounts in the Isle of Man.
Meehan's father is Brian Meehan who is serving a life sentence for the murder in 1996 of campaigning Dublin journalist Veronica Guerin.
Meanwhile, as the Irish judicial process in the case of George Redmond grinds slowly on political figures and government agencies in the Isle of Man seem unwilling to comment publicly on a period of almost two decades when the Isle of Man was the bolt-hole for the proceeds of corruption, serious crime and tax evasion by Irish Nationals, a time that was paradoxically only brought to a conclusion (if concluded it is) by the actions of the Irish government and its agencies.
It is as if the Isle of Man authorities are afraid that if the period is subject to thorough scrutiny then the deficiencies in its financial controls will be exposed.
How can the Manx public be sure that systems which in the past failed so lamentably are now up to the job?
See also Celtic News:
No: 1401 SLUSH FUND ALLEGATIONS POINT TO ISLE OF MAN BANKING SYSTEM Mar 7, 2004 No: 1359 REDMOND - FLOOD REPORT DUE NEXT WEEK Jan 18, 2004 No: 1094 MANX LINKS TO DUBLIN CORRUPTION TRIAL May 17, 2003 No: 893 FLOOD REPORT HIGHLIGHTS MANX LINKS Sep 26, 2002 No: 665 FINANCE SECTOR - MORE 'MURK' THAN TRANSPARENCY Mar 9, 2002
No: 61 NAME "DIRTY CASH" BANKS CALL May 23, 2000
J B Moffatt Director of Information Celtic League
25/04/07
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