Seán FitzPatrick denies misleading auditors charges at trial

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

Seán FitzPatrick has pleaded not guilty to 27 offences under the 1990 Companies Act. These comprise 22 charges of making a misleading, false or deceptive statement to auditors and five charges of furnishing false information between 2002 and 2007. He is accused of misleading auditors about multi-million euro loans. The proceedings were reported on 16 February 2017.

At Dublin Circuit Criminal Court on 16 February 2017, defence counsel Bernard Condon SC put it to EY auditor Kieran Kelly that he had engaged in “performance theatre” with investigators from the Office of the Director of Corporate Enforcement. Mr Kelly denied this and denied trying to buy time by asking to examine documents. He said his solicitors had advised him to examine the documents to understand them and reflect if needed.

Mr Kelly accepted that he had inadvertently given misleading evidence to Judge Mary Ellen Ring in an earlier trial about how his Garda statement was compiled. Mr Condon said he was not suggesting deliberate perjury or intentional misleading of the court and attributed the earlier evidence to a lack of recollection which Mr Kelly later tried to correct.

Questioned about his evidence at the 2015 trial, Mr Kelly accepted he had seen portions of Vincent Bergin’s statement before making his own, despite previously saying otherwise. He said he had not remembered the full statement-taking process. He also agreed that A&L Goodbody had prepared his draft statement and emailed it to him and others, including people within EY.

The trial continued before Judge John Aylmer and a jury.