A High Court battle is looming over the €13 million compensation claim by controversial property company Jackson Way for land in south Dublin which was compulsorily acquired for the South-Eastern motorway.
Almost a year after the award was made to the company, which is under investigation by the Mahon tribunal, Dún Laoghaire county council has yet to make the payment. The tribunal resumes its investigations into Jackson Way tomorrow.
The council says Jackson Way must prove its title to the land at Carrickmines before any money can be paid over. Although company representatives forwarded documents to the council earlier this year, council officials maintain Jackson Way's legal claim to the land has yet to be proven.
In addition, they are monitoring events at the tribunal, which has investigated allegations of bribery surrounding the company, as well as trying to establish who actually owns Jackson Way.
Earlier this year, the tribunal heard evidence from Mr Frank Friel, a Dublin solicitor who handled the conveyancing of the Carrickmines land for Jackson Way in the 1990s, which appeared to suggest that the company did not have a valid legal title to the land.
The council has followed this evidence "with great interest," according to one source, and was unlikely to pay out any compensation until the tribunal reports. With this unlikely to happen for several years, Jackson Way may have to go to the High Court to obtain an early order for payment.
Tomorrow's tribunal hearings into the ownership of Jackson Way are the first since July. This module of the tribunal's investigation is expected to end by early November.
The company's claim was made in respect of 20 acres of 100 acres of land it owns at Carrickmines, for which it originally sought €116 million in compensation. Ownership of Jackson Way has been linked to a solicitor, Mr John Caldwell, and businessman Mr Jim Kennedy, who bought the land from a local farmer for €840,000 in 1989.
Mr Kennedy is accused of giving money to former government press secretary Mr Frank Dunlop to bribe county councillors in return for the rezoning of the land. He has refused to return to Ireland from his homes in the Isle of Man or Gibraltar to give evidence to the tribunal.
