A senior Garda officer has been arrested over his alleged dealings with the media when members of the force took two Roma children from their families after their skin, eye and hair colour aroused suspicions around the children’s parentage.
The officer now under arrest has already had his phone examined and his office searched under warrant.
His arrest on Thursday morning was anticipated but has been greeted with surprise in Garda and security circles as he was authorised to speak to the media at the time of the contentious events and had been instructed to do so.
The National Union of Journalists said there were “unusual aspects” to the case that it would be “watching very closely”.
"It would be important that nothing would happen that would damage the release of information in the public interest," said NUJ Irish secretary Seamus Dooley.
‘Balance of probability’
The former Ombudsman for Children Emily Logan in a report published last July concluded information about one of two children taken from their homes in October 2013 in Westmeath and Dublin had "on the balance of probability" been disclosed by a member of the Garda to the journalist who wrote the initial reports on the first child being taken.
It went on to say that all parties involved in the case “regarded this development as deeply troubling and highly regrettable”.
The information reported did not lead to the children being taken. Instead, it confirmed the Garda had taken them, with the event becoming a major embarrassment to the force.
The families were forced to undergo DNA testing to prove their link to the children, after which they were returned to their parents.
Ms Logan said the disclosure of the information about one of the children may have amounted to a breach of discipline and/or an offence.
While she did not recommend a criminal investigation, Garda Commissioner Noirin O’Sullivan was quick to establish an inquiry.
Senior officer
That inquiry identified a senior officer based in Garda Headquarters, Phoenix Park, Dublin, as a suspect and it is he who was arrested at 7.30am on Thursday. He went to a Garda station in Dublin by arrangement.
A number of Garda sources said they were surprised the allegations were being treated as a criminal matter rather than a possible professional error.
The two Roma children were taken from their families by the Garda in October 2013 and briefly held in the care of the HSE before being returned when DNA evidence established the familial link.
Members of the public relayed suspicions the children had been abducted because their hair, eyes and skin were not the same colour as the Roma family groups they were living with.
The reports to the Garda were prompted by a case in the international media at the time about a blonde-haired, blue-eyed child having allegedly been abducted by a Roma couple in Greece.
