DUBLIN

WITH THE NUMBERS of Irish police officers being charged with criminal offences rising, fresh calls have been made for the establishment of a special court to deal with police crimes.

“It’s definitely an idea whose day has come, I believe,” said a Sinn Fein party worker who fell foul of the *Heavy Gang in the 1970s. “The courts are beginning to get clogged with **Garda cases, and it’s interfering with the lives of ordinary decent criminals. I suppose we could call it the Special Branch Court, or something like that. And who needs juries anyway? They’re a big imposition and the Irish state has demonstrated that justice could be ***disposed of (sic) without them for decades.”

Moro N., a recently released narcotics trafficker, convicted in the Special Criminal Court, who has moved to Spain for his health, says that corrupt police officers cannot be allowed to infect the court system. “I mean they’re part of the whole justice edifice, aren’t they? They shouldn’t be investigated and tried by their own, surely. ****Quis custodiet ipsos custodes? as we used to say in Portlaoise, of a night.”

Anto, who just likes a good laugh, says a Special Garda Court, whatever it’s called, just has to be broadcast. “And if you give it to RTE, the station’s financial woes will be over in a day. Me, I’d watch it on Tik Tok.”

*Irish police officers who liked long lunches and even longer interrogations – ED

**An Garda Siochana (Guardians of the Peace), the Irish Police Service – ED

***Not sure if he meant to say “dispensed with”. Perhaps not – ED

***Who Watches The Watchers? (Snooty way of saying Power Corrupts And Absolute Power Corrupts Absolutely) – ED