Gerry Adams replies to Sunday Tribune on latest cover-up charges
In the interests of fairness and to show we’re not beating up on the hard pressed President, here in full is Gerry Adams ‘s reply to the Sunday Tribune allegations, Not through a proxy or spokesperson, but in his own words.
What Suzanne Breen failed to say was that neither she nor the Sunday Tribune had asked me any questions. Neither did they ask me for an interview and no attempts were made to contact me. Neither Suzanne Breen nor any other Sunday Tribune journalist bothered to turn up at any of the press events I hosted.
Continues below the fold.Gerry Adams continues..
The PSNI letter explicitly advises me to refrain from speaking to the media about the case as it could possibly prejudice any future trial.
With this advice in mind I showed the questions from the Sunday Tribune to my solicitor Seamus Collins of PJ McGrory & Co. His advice is that he agrees with the contents of the letter from the PSNI that I should refrain from commenting further about these matters and he has advised me in the strongest terms not to respond to these questions.
Nothwithstanding this, it is my intention and with my solicitors advice in mind, to deal with the matters you raise on the basis that what follows is already in the public domain.
…professional advice and experience convinced me that my role was to support the victims, protect the victim’s right to anonymity
I did not tell anyone in Sinn Féin of the allegations. There has been no cover up by Sinn Féin. The party did not know of the allegations against Liam Adams.
Neither was there any cover-up by me. The facts are straightforward: when Áine made her allegations against her father it was one of my family members who accompanied her and her mother to the Social Services. The RUC were also informed. The statutory bodies with responsibility for dealing with child sexual abuse know of these allegations. The manner in which they then dealt with this requires scrutiny. The Sunday Tribune has conducted no such scrutiny. The RUC received a complaint of sexual abuse of a minor. What did it do?
I only became aware on one occasion of his membership of the party. That was in 1997 when I heard that he was thinking of putting his name forward as a candidate. I blocked that and moved to get him to withdraw from the party.
I was not aware that he later involved himself with Sinn Féin in Lower Andersonstown .
When he worked in the Clonard Youth Club I tried to get him to leave and when he wouldn’t I ensured that the authorities in Clonard were made aware of the allegation. It has also since transpired that the RUC cleared him to work in this project despite being aware of the allegation.
My point was very clear, you wouldn’t purposely put yourself in a place/situation where you knew that you would meet your attacker and the people who so unsatisfactorily ‘investigated’ your attack on an almost daily basis.
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The better to eat you with, my dear! NOM NOM NOM NOM NOM NOM NOM
“That’s rather like saying a woman raped at work should quit her job. I don’t think you’ve really thought this through.”
In normal circumstances a woman raped at work would go to the police who would arrest her attacker and he would be suspended if not sacked until convicted.
And in normal circumstances a woman wouldnt then willingly go seek employment in the same company as her attacker.
My point is these arnt normal circumstances.
Suzanne Breen and Mary Lou McDonald ding dong today on Pat Kenny show.
Elf-een
The suggestion seems to be a victim would give up the life she knew, the cause she believes in, and run, to start again somewhere else
It is always difficult for the victim in a rape case, as a recent trial here shows. In such claustrophobic republican circles it must have been almost impossible to do more than make sure that if they did meet, it was in a crowd.
It is not for us to judge what is or is not acceptable or predictable behaviour in victims.
Pippakin I’m not saying her behaviour was unacceptable in fact its very understandable in the circumstances. What I’m saying is to stop a repeat of it the lure of these organisations needs to be broken.
My point was in so called normal society you wouldnt go and place yourself in a situation where you would be likely to meet your attacker daily. Thats emotional self harming.
But this is not a normal society and we can only hope that what these cases do, if any good is to come from this, is stop this kind of mafia style tell no one but the boys culture.
3.Suzanne Breen and Mary Lou McDonald ding dong today on Pat Kenny show.
I guess Marty Lou joined the band too late. Last stage out of Pervie ville and all that.
The Pervie mindset must be decommissioned. It even infects the Dublin 4 set. If Mary Lou was unelectable before, look at her situation now.
Bring back Bernie McA: a lady with class, a conscience and a lovely singing voice.
Elf-een
Sorry! I completely agree, it has been the terrible atmosphere these people had to live in that has been the cause. Allowing sadists and child abusers to move in and take advantage of situations.
I would like to see every one of these ‘cosy’ little gang structures borken up.
Paddy
I could not agree more!
If they are not careful the parties most closely associated with loyalist or republican areas and abuse will lose all credibility.
It is not for a member to say ‘it is not true and nothing to do with us’. Any parties implicated must suspend, await the result of investigations or trials, and base their actions on the outcomes.
In the case of the security services and social services, any investigation into them will have to await the result of any/all trials, which is normal practice since to act before trial could be said to influence the outcome, and we cant have that.
I have not been able to downnload the Pat Kenny interviews and would be grateful if a direct link could be shown on slugger.
Is anyone else over this fucking scandal?
You mean the Provos contained some creeps and their organization covered up and intimidated vicitims for them? Wow, what a revelation. I thought they were all modern day Pearse’s and Kevin Barrys.
So Brian, that makes it ok. The Pervies raped little children, who should get over it. Let’s leave their other stomach churning acheivements to one side for now. It is really amazing that child rapists have their defenders.
Brian
I sincerely hope we are not over this ‘fucking scandal’.
Questions have not been answered.
The intelligence of the public has been insulted, and the old republican ‘shut up youre nobody’ has prevailed.
I hope sites like this one keep up the pressure.
I’m not sure how I’m defending child rapists. Obviously those that can be prosecuted should, and these people should be investigated.
What I meant is that I’m just over giving a shit about any new detail coming out or any new timeline, etc. After the initial story, none of this is really too suprising (with the exception of Joe Cahill’s niece being one of the victims).
The cover up/confuse machine is in full court press, the political parties are trying to score as many points as they can, and the victims have to relive their terrible experiences in the paper everyday.
And to be honest, I doubt anyone other than Liam will ever see a day in jail. I also doubt that Gerry will step down as head of the party, and I doubt this will significantly effect the number of votes Sinn Fein gets.
Here’s a link to the Suzanne /Mary lou debate.
http://dynamic.rte.ie/quickaxs/209-r…hpatkenny.smil
hands down victory to suzanne I think.
Re that debate, there may be a few minutes news on the link before the interviews begin.