THE TRIAL OF three former Anglo Irish Bank officials accused of deceiving the Revenue and hiding or destroying bank records has been adjourned until Monday after the court ran out of jurors to swear in.
Aoife Maguire (60) of Rothe Abbey, South Circular Road, Kilmainham, Dublin, Bernard Daly (65) of Collins Avenue West, Whitehall, Dublin and Tiarnan O’Mahoney (54) of Glen Pines, Enniskerry, Co. Wicklow, are facing charges relating to offences allegedly committed in 2003 and 2004. They have pleaded not guilty to all charges.
All three are accused of conspiring to destroy, mutilate or falsify documents relating to accounts of John Peter O’Toole.
Mr Daly and Mr O’Mahoney are accused of furnishing a list of bank accounts which didn’t include the account of Mr O’Toole.
All three are also accused of conspiring to defraud the Revenue by deleting or concealing accounts held by Anglo in the name of Mr O’Toole.
Ms Maguire and Mr O’Mahoney are accused of conspiring to destroy records of six accounts and of conspiring to defraud the Revenue by deleting or concealing some or all of the six accounts.
The names of the accounts are: Lock Ltd/Suzie Ltd, Carnahalla Ltd/Suzie Ltd, Lock Ltd, Carnahalla Ltd, Tirumvirate Properties Ltd and Sean FitzPatrick Trust/Crohan O’Shea Trust
The trial, which is expected to run until the end of July, was due to begin today at Dublin Circuit Criminal Court before Judge Patrick McCartan after a jury were sworn in another court.
Fresh panel
However only seven people were sworn in before the court ran out of potential jurors. Jury swearing will now continue on Monday with a fresh jury panel.
More than 60 potential jurors told Judge Patricia Ryan that they could not serve for various reasons. Another 13 were objected to by counsel for the State and the defendants.
Before swearing in began, jurors were told they should not serve if they have “any strong feelings” about Anglo Irish Bank. They were also told they should not serve if they had any connection with or if they owned shares in the former bank.
Furthermore, the judge ordered that jurors should not serve if they had any connection to The Revenue, Ernst and Young or the auditing sector.
Gardaí
A list of potential witnesses was read out which included former Anglo employees, Bank of Ireland staff, revenue officers, tax consultants and gardaí.
Judge Ryan told the panel that Mr O’Mahoney is now a business consultant and was chief operations officer with Anglo until 2004.
Mr Daly is the former company secretary of Anglo and subsequently sat on the board of the Donnycarney and District Credit Union. He was also the chairman of the Irish Pensions Board and the president of The Irish Chartered Institute of Management Accountants.
Jurors were told that Ms Maguire is from Cappagh Road in Finglas but now lives in Kilmainham. She is involved in the running of The Good Council GAA Club in Driminagh.
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