A DETECTIVE SERGEANT who was the focus of a prolonged campaign of harassment says he fears for his family if the abuse continues when the man is released from prison.
Conor Gilmartin was stationed in Shankill, Dublin, when he started receiving abuse from a group of people 2010. He was being called “corrupt” and “evil” and one person started leaving comments about the officer on a website used to rate solicitors.
After years of enduring the torrents of abuse, the man who was slandering Det Sgt Gilmartin received five years in prison. Despite him being incarcerated – Gilmartin said the online bully is still someone who sticks in his mind from time to time.
“It started in the form of websites that were dedicated to me – Sergeant Conor Gilmartin is corrupt and evil was the title of it. It went on to say various things, that the gardai in Shankill were corrupt, that they were telling lies before the court. I made attempts myself to try to deal with it. I found one of the developers from WordPress, he was Irish-based and I made contact with him. The result was very quickly I got it taken down as it was content outside of their terms of service.”
Despite having the comments removed from some internet sites, more and more started to pop up. Gilmartin believes a concerted effort was being made by a number of people to blacken his name.
Members of the Association of Garda Sergeants and Inspectors (AGSI) are this week discussing the welfare of its members with many calling on management to put more supports in place for officers struggling with online abuse.
Gilmartin said that the abuse he suffered is becoming more commonplace and more sinister. During his own trouble, online commenters knew that he had children and other intimate details of his life – something which concerned him greatly.
“It was kind of like whack-a-mole, like the more I got rid of them, the faster they would pop up. The worst of the lot began when I was the only guard with a profile on rateyoursolicitor.com. He put up his name and said he was complaining to the garda ombudsman saying gardai in Shankill were corrupt and so was I.
Before the courts
“I know the person we were dealing with had been before the courts on other matters involving his wife and was prosecuted for harassing his wife and it was this that caused him to see the guards as the source of his problems instead of looking at himself and examining his own behaviour.
“I still expect that it will carry on in the future but I had no choice but to challenge it and get it dealt with. I was a victim.”
When asked if he feared that someone would turn up outside his home one night, he added: “It was a concern and still is a concern for myself and my family and I’ve taken actions to try to make myself as safe as I can be.
Some of the comments up on it would be things addressed to me saying ‘you’re reading this, do something about it take action against me if you like’, ‘your children will read this one day, are you having an affair with my wife’, all sorts of stuff.
“I can go there myself and read this if I want and probably upset myself but I could take the view it’s like the man shouting in a forest.
“I’ve heard it from lots of people, one friend said he was checking up garda pay rates and said do you know what’s on the internet about you because he typed in garda sergeant and the first thing that came up was Garda Gilmartin (is corrupt.)
“So you can’t avoid it. You can’t get away from it. It’s stressful and you can never get rid of it because anything up on the internet can be searched.”
Management
Gilmartin said initially he did not receive much help from management at the start of the problem. He thought that it should have been dealt with as a health and safety issue as it was something negative coming as a direct result of his job. But he said he was glad he brought it to the courts and has encouraged anyone who feels they are a victim of a crime to report it.
“I didn’t get much help at the outset. There were people who did help but there were others who I felt didn’t help. I have people who heard me out and I reported it through the channels along the lines of it being a health and safety issue.
“It was my welfare. I highlighted the fact that there seems to be very little we can do about it. There was much debate about whether this actually constituted harassment as well. There were phone calls as well. He had my phone number.
“It’s like you could make the analogy of someone putting posters up around the city saying Sergeant Gilmartin is corrupt and evil.
“The long run was he got 5 years imprisonment and he is still in custody two years later.
This person even though before the courts couldn’t see the folly of his ways at all. He was reinforced by a whole group of people outside the court.
“Where do we support each other within the guards if we are not seen as victims at any stage. It’s assumed you should keep a stiff upper lip and carry on. This will be on the internet forever. My children will read this. My grandchildren will read it. We could do more.”
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