The Mahon Tribunal was appointed in 1997 to inquire into the planning history of 726 acres of land and to investigate all improper payments made to politicians in connection with the planning process.
A number of those probed by the tribunal are party to bank accounts and trusts set up in Jersey and the Isle of Man and the proceedings have been widely reported in the Irish press.
Last week solicitor John Caldwell was questioned about a British Virgin Island company, Vino Properties Ltd, and a trust administered by Jersey solicitor Nicholas Morgan of CI Law Trust.
According to the transcript of the proceedings, on the tribunal website, Mr Caldwell told the judges that a Morgan family trust had been set up in relation to Vino.
He was asked in considerable detail about his precise relationship with Mr Morgan and the Jersey firm in relation to ‘sizeable sums’ resulting from the sale of land totalling £2.
m.
Tribunal members found it difficult to accept that Mr Caldwell was not able to produce any documentation relating to the trust, but Mr Caldwell said that although he had asked Mr Morgan to provide it, he had been told he was not entitled to the documentation.
Structure Jersey law firm Bedell Cristin was also named in the proceedings, in relation to an offshore structure established for the buyer of the land, Joe Tiernan.
Last month former Fianna Fial minister Raymond Burke – who was investigated by the tribunal between 1998 and 2001 – was jailed for six months by the Dublin Circuit Criminal Court after admitting to falsifying tax returns.
The conviction stemmed from the tribunal investigation which uncovered offshore earnings at AIB in the Isle of Man and from a Jersey company, Caviar Ltd.
