A garda sergeant, who was for several years harassed and intimidated by false claims posted about him on the internet, was awarded €8,000 damages at a garda compensation hearing in the High Court on Monday.
Mr Justice Michael Twomey said the damages related to personal injuries suffered by Sgt Conor Gilmartin as a result of the internet posts and were not in relation to damages for injury to character.
When Judge Twomey asked Sgt Gilmartin if he had considered suing 57-year-old architect Sean Carraher for defamation of character, Sgt Gilmartin said he could not afford to and his representative body, the Association of Garda Sergeants and Inspectors (Agsi), had refused to fund such a claim.
Sgt Gilmartin, who was transferred from Shankill in Co Dublin to a station in Co Cork as a result of phone calls and on-line harassment by Carraher, told his counsel, Francis McGagh, that he had been accused of being “evil” and “corrupt.”
He said Carraher, of Stradbrook Hill, Blackrock, Co Dublin, who he believed to be now living on social welfare payments, had been jailed for five years for harassment of him between the years of 2009 and 2011.
Judge Patrick McCartan, sentencing Carraher in 2016, said he had all the attributes of a bully and had made allegations against Sgt Gilmartin without one whit of evidence to support them.
Sgt Gilmartin, now living in Cloyne, Co Cork, told Mr McGagh, who appeared with Kiera O’Reilly of Keans Solicitors, that allegations by Carraher to the Garda Ombudsman Commission about him had been rejected.
He said allegations to the HSE about him having been involved in child abuse had been found to be false and baseless.
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Source: Irish Times
