Adams' brother sought over alleged abuse

[Puckoon]

I haven't read the whole thread, nor the full story in the papers, but I am slightly uncomfortable with the vilification that Gerry Adams is getting.

The question I would like to ask everyone: Is there is any circumstance where you knew your brother murdered or raped someone but you would not report it to the police?

Yes there are circumstances, but it would be wrong and it would be the coward within me, and I would have to live with the decision forever and accept the fall out when it went public.

Did Gerry keep this quiet to not damage the political progress of the time?

[deiseach]

I can understand Gerry Adams struggling with what to do. I couldn't say with certainty that I could bring myself to shop one of my own family members. However, if Gerry Adams came out and said "I couldn't bring myself to shop one of my own family members", his political career would be killed stone dead. So instead we get the classic Shinner response: admit there were mistakes in the general (we condemn ALL violence), refuse to admit any mistake in the particular (reject the politics of the latest atrocity), and shoot the messenger - figuratively or literally, it depends on the circumstances.

[muppet]

I haven't read the whole thread, nor the full story in the papers, but I am slightly uncomfortable with the vilification that Gerry Adams is getting.

The question I would like to ask everyone: Is there is any circumstance where you knew your brother murdered or raped someone but you would not report it to the police?

It is very simple, Gerry Adams knew his brother was a paedophile, yet he allowed him to work in two youth clubs in the constituency he lived and was an MP for.

Is there any evidence that he abused or was interesting in abusing anyone else beside his daughter? I know that is a very callous statement, and I don't mean to belittle the pain felt by Liam Adams daughter. Has Liam Adams other children disowned him?

PS. I have an acquaintance who had to give evidence against his father who had killed my acquaintance's mother. Even though he hated his father, it was not as straight forward as you might think.

This is fair comment as family is family. One the one hand Liam is his brother, on the other Áine is his niece. This would be very difficult in any family.

Most reasonable people could understand the personal conflicts this might cause.

However Liam worked for youth groups after Gerry was made aware of the abuse. This is a serious problem for Gerry no matter how you look at it.

[trileacman]

I ma no SF lover but I find it very harsh that the focus is on a relative of the sex offender and not the sex offender.  The daughter mentions Adams sending her a book in 1996 and how she couldn;t believe he would do that, but when is he first (according to the daughter) meant to have been made aware of the accusations against his brother?

Something like 1987

[Maguire01]

I haven't read the whole thread, nor the full story in the papers, but I am slightly uncomfortable with the vilification that Gerry Adams is getting.

The question I would like to ask everyone: Is there is any circumstance where you knew your brother murdered or raped someone but you would not report it to the police?

It is very simple, Gerry Adams knew his brother was a paedophile, yet he allowed him to work in two youth clubs in the constituency he lived and was an MP for.

Is there any evidence that he abused or was interesting in abusing anyone else beside his daughter? I know that is a very callous statement, and I don't mean to belittle the pain felt by Liam Adams daughter. Has Liam Adams other children disowned him?

Is this relevant? Anyway, i'm fairly sure I heard that his other children testified or gave statements in his defence, i.e. that none of the others were abused.

[Maguire01]

I haven't read the whole thread, nor the full story in the papers, but I am slightly uncomfortable with the vilification that Gerry Adams is getting.

I ma no SF lover but I find it very harsh that the focus is on a relative of the sex offender and not the sex offender. 

I assume you were both uncomfortable with the attention on Cardinal Brady, when it was Brendan Smyth who was the offender?

[Maguire01]

And yes, I agree that there was a definite element of sensationalism about Breen's article - particularly the headlines and the conclusion - but the substance of the seemed fairly consistent with what was established in the 2010 interview and subsequent court proceedings. But happy if you can point to any contradictions or inaccuracies - i'm open to correction.

You need to be more forensic than that. Primarily, you are siding with Breen's interpretation and you assume that you remember Adam's testimony and that you remember it objectively.

Adams not going to the police before 2006 is no issue with me, I can accept his explanation. Not going to the police in 1987 when he accepted that his niece was abused by his brother, definitely no issue with that.

Gerry went to the police in 2007, but he withheld farirly important information... he went back to the police in 2009, on the eve of the UTV programme, and told them that his brother had admitted what he had done:

The court also heard how in 2007 Mr Adams told police about how 20 years earlier, in Buncrana in Co Donegal, his brother Liam Adams denied that he had sexually assaulted his (Liam's) daughter Aine.

This statement was made in June 2007, Eilis McDermott QC, for Liam Adams, told the court. But it wasn't until October 2009 – "two years and four months later" – that Gerry Adams told police Liam Adams had admitted to him in 2000 that he sexually assaulted Ms Adams.

Ms McDermott said it appeared that Mr Adams and his solicitor had withheld information from the police between June 2007 and October 2009 about Liam Adams's alleged confession.

"Not only were you withholding information from the police but your solicitor, it appears, was withholding information for two years and four months," she said.

"You went to the police on this occasion [October 2009] because you knew that the question of your withholding information was going to become a matter of public debate," added Ms McDermott.
http://www.irishtimes.com/news/crime-and-law/gerry-adams-said-his-statement-to-police-was-not-motivated-by-tv-programme-1.1369102

Does that sound credible to you?

Adams' relationship with his brother? yes there was some contact but quite obviously and it's beyond dispute, that their relationship was estranged.
By my understanding of estrangement, Gerry was estranged from his brother. No evidence presented by Breen contradicts that Adam's was estranged from his brother. But perhaps  Gerry's relationship with his brother appears a normal brotherly relationship to you?

Here was Gerry's explanation:

The prosecution put it to Mr Adams that he had said he had not been in contact with his brother for 15 years from 1987 until 2002, while photographs and other evidence suggested they had been in contact on a number of occasions.

"Well your grasp of the calendar of these events is better than mine," Gerry Adams said, adding that the separation may not have been as long as 15 years.

Mr Adams told the court that he "did have a problem with exact timelines" for events, but denied that he had lied to a journalist about his brother in an effort to distance himself from him.
http://sluggerotoole.com/2013/10/03/in-his-brothers-child-rape-case-gerry-adams-faces-his-own-appalling-vista/comment-page-1/#comment-1410181

We get another piece reported on the BBC news.
'Gerry said that he told the authorities at a youth project in Clonard, where Liam Adams worked part-time between 1998 and 2003, about the allegations against his brother.
The authorities at Clonard have said they have no record of any complaint against Liam Adams.'

We have verbal evidence of a statement from Adams. The Clonard people might be saying,  yeah we heard him but he didn't write it down in a formal letter or we didn't write it down after he told us or if we did write it down we can't find it and even if we could find it, we won't, because it will put us in a bad light. So better we just say we have no record of it. And when we say we have no record of it, it's the truth, we are not telling a lie.

You, with a long history on this board of being 'antaganostic' against SF will automatically believe that Gerry is being dubious and Clonard's answer damns Gerry. You regard the Clonard answer as being valid evidence to disprove gerry's statement.
The objective perspective is, Gerry's account stands, there's no solid reason to disbelieve him. Gerry's account of informing Clonard is just as valid as them saying we have no record of it, and it could be more valid.
One can certainly question his efforts to conceal his brother's crimes from coming out into the public arena.

When you say "We have verbal evidence of a statement from Adams" you mean that Gerry says he did it, right? That's the extent of the evidence?

Anyway, i'm not necessarily basing my opinion on whether he did or didn't inform those in Clonard. But, say Gerry is telling the truth, if he could see that those in Clonard didn't take action, was it enough for him to consider that he had done his duty? Is that not like saying that Sean Brady had done his duty when he reported the Brendan Smyth details to his superiors, and it was irrelevant that he did nothing when he could see that Smyth continued to work up the road?

[Leo]

We know from his IRA denials that Gerry always tells the truth, don't we>

[Gaffer]

If Gerry told the truth his beard would fall off !!!!

[Tony Baloney]

I haven't read the whole thread, nor the full story in the papers, but I am slightly uncomfortable with the vilification that Gerry Adams is getting.

The question I would like to ask everyone: Is there is any circumstance where you knew your brother murdered or raped someone but you would not report it to the police?

It is very simple, Gerry Adams knew his brother was a paedophile, yet he allowed him to work in two youth clubs in the constituency he lived and was an MP for.

Is there any evidence that he abused or was interesting in abusing anyone else beside his daughter? I know that is a very callous statement, and I don't mean to belittle the pain felt by Liam Adams daughter. Has Liam Adams other children disowned him?

PS. I have an acquaintance who had to give evidence against his father who had killed my acquaintance's mother. Even though he hated his father, it was not as straight forward as you might think.

This is fair comment as family is family. One the one hand Liam is his brother, on the other Áine is his niece. This would be very difficult in any family.

Most reasonable people could understand the personal conflicts this might cause.

However Liam worked for youth groups after Gerry was made aware of the abuse. This is a serious problem for Gerry no matter how you look at it.

This is the killer blow. Even if felt he couldn't report his brother to the police, which on one level is understandable, did he do anything to ensure the brother could cause no further harm? It appears he didn't and it may be that he was prepared to sacrifice the neice for the bigger prize, his political career.

[Minder]

Even without outing his brother he surely could have used his considerable influence and had him removed from Clonard YC and the Blackie Centre, and told to forget about working in anymore youth clubs.

[Fear Bun Na Sceilpe]

The man has lost the plot anyhow, just need to follow him on twitter to realise that, Pearse Doherty needs to take over

[give her dixie]

This cross examination of Gerry Adams by Ms McDermott QC at the Crown Court in Belfast on Monday April 22nd 2013 is well worth reading in order to plainly see where Adams lied and covered up for his abusing brother.



http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/shared/bsp/hi/pdfs/08_10_2013_cross_exam_gerry_adams.pdf

[Maguire01]

It's a bit late in the day for Adams to whinge about media treatment

Friday, October 18, 2013

IT WOULD be an extraordinary turn of events if Gerry Adams was to see his political career ended by the gross misjudgment he exercised in his greatly delayed reporting of his niece's allegations of sexual abuse against her father, his brother Liam.

By Matt Cooper

It is not that the Sinn Féin leader's failures in dealing appropriately with what he knew when he knew it are not serious, because they clearly are, and that the sexual abuse of children is not an exceptionally serious matter, which most clearly it is.

But it is still strange that a man whose career has prospered despite being, at best, an apologist for the many murders committed by the IRA, and at worst, one of its leading commanders, something he denies, would be brought down by this, rather than by the death and destruction the IRA carried out with Sinn Féin's endorsement.

Adams is in whinge mode at present, outraged that his political enemies are out to get him and that the media is following the story of how he dealt with Liam Adams's rape of his daughter Áine, and the eventual conviction, in great detail.

But what does he expect? Of course his political opponents are trying to take advantage but that doesn't mean that the points they make aren't correct and valid. Maybe some elements of the media are making up for being too soft on Adams in recent times — he and Sinn Féin have been very quick to demonise the media as "anti-peace process" when not playing along with the Sinn Féin peacemaker agenda and it got to some journalists who have pulled their punches in cowardly fashion — but again, coverage of this issue is legitimate and necessary.

As it happens, it is easy enough to understand why Adams didn't go to the police in 1987. Given the depth of antipathy between Adams and the RUC at the time it would have been extraordinary had Adams decided to turn his brother over to the RUC. Áine Adams, as a 14-year-old, withdrew her complaint to the police, apparently fearing that they would use it to gather intelligence on republicans in her family, including her uncle Gerry.

Who put that in her mind, at a time when she wanted justice and protection? Was she old enough and canny enough to realise that the IRA remained very active and that informing against one of its members was punishable by death? There is no suggestion that Liam Adams was an IRA man. Remarkably though, Gerry Adams told an inquiry conducted by Declan Kearney, the Sinn Féin chairman, that he only became aware that Liam was a party member in 1997, when Liam lived and worked in Dundalk.

Apparently Gerry ordered his brother to leave the party, but did not warn local members. He has subsequently said that he always believed Áine despite Liam's denials in 1987. If so, why didn't he act earlier against his brother? His problems grow though because of what happened this century. Liam Adams apparently told Gerry in 2000 that one aspect of the allegation was true. That was the time that the Sinn Féin leader, in the peace process era, should have reported his brother.

He didn't. Instead when Liam subsequently moved back to Belfast why did Gerry let him live with him and help get a job in a youth club associated with Clonard monastery? And why did Gerry allow Liam to reinvolve himself with Sinn Féin in west Belfast in 2000 if that was the year that Liam made his limited confession of sexual abuse, short of rape, to Gerry? This was also the same year Sinn Féin introduced guidelines to deal with allegations of sexual and child abuse but Adams did not inform his own party of the most serious allegations against his brother until they were made public in 2007.

To have assumed that Liam was not a potential danger to other children was another frightening misjudgment, one that Gerry was not qualified to make.

Gerry Adams has attempted to make much of the fact that he reported Liam to the police in 2009 and that he subsequently gave evidence against him at his criminal trial. The latter action stands to his credit; it must have been very hard for one sibling to give evidence against another, even if it was the right thing to do.

However, it has been confirmed that he did only after he knew that UTV was about to broadcast a major documentary item on the incest within his family. That decision raises questions about cynicism. It is also the case that Adams was photographed, laughing, in the company of his brother after 2000.

The way Liam Adams moved around various parts of Sinn Féin, north and south, prior to that date and went to the United States for a while, bears striking resemblance to the way the Catholic Church in Ireland moved its errant members around from parish to parish, allowing them to evade justice but also putting more and more children at risk from their evil.

Back in 2009, when commenting about child abuse by clerics in the Dublin diocese, the Sinn Féin vice president Mary Lou McDonald, said anybody found to have covered up the abuse of children should be arrested and face the full rigours of the law. "Anyone, including gardaí, found to be complicit in the cover-up of child abuse must be arrested and made to face the full rigours of the law," she said.

In March 2010, Martin McGuinness, alongside Gerry Adams the most important person in Sinn Féin, said that Cardinal Sean Brady should be "considering his position" after the revelation of his failures to report the notorious paedophile Fr Brendan Smyth to the police. I wrote in this column at the time that was a remarkable thing for McGuinness to say, given what was known then by the public about the dysfunctional Adams family.

THREE years on and Adams is complaining about "the despicable manner in which this issue is being dealt with by the DUP and others, and by some cynical elements of the media". He said this has become trial by media and a witch-hunt. A sense of proportion is something that Adams himself is missing.

"I know that I have committed no offence, and I know that I did what I considered to be the right thing, and that I co-operated fully with the PSNI, the Public Prosecution Service, with the court," he has said. But when and why? And why should we believe his version of events, when we know that Adams's history is to say almost anything that is convenient to his political needs of the day? His loyal supporters in Sinn Féin, who treat him as an iconic figure and who believe he can do no wrong, are facing a test of their intelligence. Can they forgive him anything? Do they always believe, as Adams seems to, that he is a victim of some devious, perfidious plot to destroy him, when this wound clearly is self-inflicted?

http://www.irishexaminer.com/opinion/columnists/matt-cooper/its-a-bit-late-in-the-day-for-adams-to-whinge-about-media-treatment-246650.html

[Maguire01]

Gerry Adams never led secret inquiry into Sinn Féin/IRA sexual abuse – SF

Gerry Adams said an article which says he led the covert internal inquiry was "scurrilous".

SINN FÉIN HAS denied allegations that party leader Gerry Adams led a covert republican investigation into claims of sexual abuse by more than 100 members of Sinn Fein and the IRA.

In a brief statement this afternoon, a spokesperson said the party "absolutely and without equivocation" rejected the claims about a secret inquiry made in the Sunday Independent.

In a tweet sent in the early hours of this morning, Adams described the article as "scurrilous".

The article by Suzanne Breen cites republican sources and says that the internal investigation was set up in the mid-2000s after a "deluge" of allegations of rape and sexual assault against members of Sinn Féin and the IRA. It says that Gerry Adams was one of four senior party figures who headed the year-long investigation.

The inquiry is alleged to have worked under the auspices of an internal Sinn Féin committee known as the 'Cosite Seasta'.  The piece also says that there is substantial documentation proving the existence of the inquiry.

Adams is currently in the spotlight over criticism of how he dealt with his brother's conviction for rape and and child abuse.

"Sinn Féin absolutely and without equivocation rejects claims made in the story in today's Sunday Independent," the Sinn Féin spokesperson said.

Firstly, Gerry Adams did not lead any internal inquiry into claims of sexual abuse against republicans.

Secondly, there was no internal inquiry into claims of sexual abuse carried out under the auspices of Sinn Féin's Coiste Seasta in 2005.

Adams has criticised what he has described as a 'witch-hunt' against him by the media following his brother Liam's conviction.

http://www.thejournal.ie/gerry-adams-inquiry-sexual-abuse-1138378-Oct2013/?utm_source=twitter_self



Is it just me or is SF's response a bit too specific? Why not say there was never any internal inquiry by SF (not limited to "2005" and the "under the auspices of Sinn Féin's Coiste Seasta")? Reads like a very qualified dismissal of the claims.