Catherine McGowan pleads not guilty to forgery charge

This report is a localnews.ie summary based on public court reporting and records; sources are listed below.

Catherine McGowan, 48, faced one count of forgery at Bray Garda Station on 15 January 2009 and two counts of using a false instrument at Bray Garda Station and Harcourt St Garda Station between 21 and 22 June 2011. She has pleaded not guilty to all three charges at Dublin Circuit Criminal Court. The proceedings were reported on 11 March 2015.

The alleged instrument was a letter from the DPP, dated 14 January 2009, directing that there be no prosecution in a clerical child abuse case.

The State finished calling evidence on 10 March 2015. Both sides had completed their closing speeches. Judge Mary Ellen Ring was due to address the jury and send it out to begin deliberations on 11 March 2015.

In his closing speech for the State, Alex Owens alleged that McGowan produced the forgery to mislead those examining her handling of the investigation. He said she knew the file had not been submitted to the DPP.

Garda Sergeant Tony Brady told defence counsel Patrick Marrinan that exhaustive inquiries had failed to establish any link between McGowan and the priest she had investigated. Patrick Marrinan said there was no link that might provide a motive for her to tell people in 2009 that the DPP had directed no prosecution.

Patrick Marrinan argued that McGowan had handled the allegations diligently. He said that when Detective Inspector Frank Keenaghan confronted her in April 2011, she rejected what counsel described as an offer to admit wrongdoing and maintained she had done nothing wrong. He also submitted that someone had a vested interest in making the investigation go away in 2009 and that documents which would have assisted her defence had gone missing.