Two people who handled protected disclosures made by Garda whistleblowers have themselves blown the whistle, alleging that reforms introduced to protect those who speak out have been undermined by senior management.
They are among four Garda whistleblowers speaking publicly for the first time in an RTÉ Investigates programme to be broadcast tonight at 9.35pm on RTÉ One.
The other two whistleblowers made protected disclosures to the office in recent years.
The Garda Protected Disclosures Office was established in 2017 as part of reforms introduced to protect whistleblowers following a series of policing scandals, including the treatment of whistleblower Sergeant Maurice McCabe.
The two key figures connected with the Garda Protected Disclosures Office are Dr Donal Corcoran and Rose Sweeney.
Dr Corcoran, a serving, plain-clothes Garda for 25 years, was a permanently designated staff member in the Office up to January 2025. Ms Sweeney, a serving civilian principal officer, is head of the Garda National Youth Diversion Bureau, and acted as a part-time protected disclosures manager.
Dr Corcoran, who holds qualifications in criminal justice, protected disclosures, law, ethics and mediation, and carried out the function of a facilitator of protected disclosures, ran the Office on behalf of protected disclosure managers and was regarded as its "institutional memory".
He himself made a protected disclosure in August 2024, and two months later he was told a new Office would be set up and that there was no place for him in it, the RTÉ Investigates documentary reports tonight.
In all, four Garda whistleblowers have emerged. They claim that grave allegations of wrongdoing and safety breaches in policing were contained and concealed by senior management under former commissioner Drew Harris.
Of the two other whistleblowers who have also come forward to speak out, one is Detective Superintendent Brian O’Reilly, the head of the Garda National Technical Bureau.
Det Supt O’Reilly was given responsibility for the Firearms Section at Garda headquarters in September 2019, days after a Garda armourer, Luke Rochford, was arrested and made allegations of irregularities related to the Firearms Section while in custody.
On 1 September, An Garda Síochána was asked a series of questions under separate headings by RTÉ Investigates in connection with tonight’s documentary.
In a response last Friday evening, the Garda Press Office did not specifically address the allegations made by the whistleblowers that were put to the organisation.
It said RTÉ Investigates had asked detailed questions on a wide range of matters that "were often based on protected disclosures that by law we are precluded from commenting on."
However, it said: "An Garda Síochána considers the area of Protected Disclosures to be of the utmost importance and is committed to ensuring the integrity of the structure, system and process for making and investigating all such reports."
It went on: "We encourage and support employees in disclosing wrongdoing and have implemented mechanisms to ensure that workers can raise concerns with the confidence that they will be listened to and that their concerns will be appropriately addressed."
A 'protected disclosure’ is the legal name for whistleblowing, when a worker or contractor speaks out when they have a reasonable belief that there is wrongdoing in an organisation.
Rita O'Reilly from RTÉ Investigates outlines the main issues raised in tonight's report
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The Protected Disclosures Act governs whistleblowing, to ensure that both the complaint, and the individual who makes it, have protections in law.
Dr Corcoran and Ms Sweeney are connected to the original whistleblowing unit, the Protected Disclosures Office, and are experienced case handlers of whistleblowing files.
They allege that senior management, including former commissioner Harris, interfered with and hampered the office in a manner that undermined its independence and delayed resolution of case files, and then replaced it with a new unit, which proceeded to close many files.
Dr Corcoran, the permanent staff member assigned to the original whistleblowers’ office and a ‘facilitator’ of disclosers for it, alleges that before the office was replaced, his functions were stymied and it became difficult for him to carry out his day-to-day operational role.
Ms Sweeney, the senior civilian manager who also held the role of a protected disclosure manager, making decisions on protected disclosure files, alleges that in the period before and after the new office was launched, she was put under increasing pressure to prematurely close files.
Whistleblowing protector becomes whistleblower
Dr Corcoran said that he found himself in a position where he felt he had no alternative but to make a protected disclosure himself in August 2024 about restrictions to his operational role and other matters.
He outlined his concerns in a detailed letter to management, telling them he was availing of the protections of the Protected Disclosures Act.
Instead of receiving an acknowledgement of the disclosure, as is required by law, he says it was met with "silence."
On 1 October 2024, he sent a reminder email, requesting a response.
He said that two days later, on 3 October 2024, a senior officer came to the Protected Disclosures Office and told him that the new Protected Disclosures Office was being launched in January 2025 and that there was no place for him in it.
When Ms Sweeney made representations to retain his experience and "institutional memory" within the new Office, she was told he would not be part of it, and that the decision was "under direction from above".
Independent Senator Michael McDowell, who as a senior counsel, represented Sgt Maurice McCabe at the Disclosures Tribunal, said that in his view, the removal of Dr Corcoran from his role in the Protected Disclosures Office after he himself made a protected disclosure was a breach of law.
"To be told, in other words, you're gone; you're not sacked, but your functions are going elsewhere, and you won't be involved anymore, that is penalisation under the remit of the protected disclosures legislation," he said.
In its statement the Garda Press Office said: "The transfer in January 2025 by the Commissioner of the Protected Disclosures Unit (PDU) to Governance and Accountability Section further strengthened protected disclosures within An Garda Síochána. For the record, there was no closure of the PDU as alleged by a third-party."
'New office'
In December 2024, a letter to Gardaí who had made protected disclosures advised them that the management of protected disclosures would change.
It said that the then Garda Commissioner Drew Harris had directed that responsibility be transferred from the 'Human Resources & People Development' department to ‘Governance & Accountability’.
"A new Protected Disclosures Office with new personnel will be operational from the 6 January 2025," it stated.
The garda website also states: "A new Garda Protected Disclosures Office was established on 6 January 2025. It is responsible for the management of Protected Disclosures in An Garda Síochána on behalf of the Garda Commissioner."
Dr Corcoran says that when he was told to vacate the office, he was initially offered an unofficial role as an expert professional researcher in HR, and he tried to work that role, but he soon found himself in an isolated, empty Superintendent’s office at the other end of the building, without allocated work and "staring at a wall."
Reform
Sen McDowell, who as Minister for Justice in 2005 introduced the first whistleblowing mechanisms in the Garda Síochána Act arising out of the Morris Tribunal on policing in Donegal, said it surprised him that no effort was made to inform members of the Oireachtas that the Protected Disclosures Office had been replaced.
"Unfortunately, given the circumstances, I'm by no means satisfied that the ending of one office and opening of another was intended as a positive reform," he said.
"I think that it may be an attempt to seek closure on matters which are of significant difficulty for An Garda Síochána".
However, in its statement, An Garda Síochána said that with the January 2025 change, "a dedicated, full-time Protected Disclosure Manager at Assistant Principal level was appointed. Prior to the transfer, multiple managers were overseeing protected disclosures on a part-time basis, while also carrying out their separate day jobs."
In addition, it said, an Inspector had been appointed to the Office. It said that "the transfer has further professionalised the service the Protected Disclosures Unit provides" and pointed to training that management and the new personnel had undertaken.
It also recommended that gardaí who wished to could avail of free, confidential third-party advice from Transparency International (Ireland) prior to making disclosures.
Transparency International (Ireland) provided former Garda armourer Luke Rochford advice in formulating his protected disclosure to the gardaí, made in August 2020.
Speaking up
Of almost 150 cases that went through the Protected Disclosures Office since 2017, Dr Corcoran told RTÉ Investigates that he has personally dealt with over 100 of them.
He said the lesson of the McCabe whistleblowing scandal was ultimately that the Gardaí had to look at protected disclosures "as potential sources of reform", but although that lesson was initially heeded, since 2019, that changed.
"Over the last seven years, I believe there is a culture of silence, obstruction, delay, and subversion within the protected disclosures remit", he said, "and it's something that I feel needs to be brought out into the open so that it can be dealt with appropriately."
As the permanent staff member in the office, Dr Corcoran advised and drafted correspondence and reports for case managers, who held busy, full-time senior positions in the organisation.
He was also a facilitator, assisting disclosers and acting as a bridge between them and the organisation. A facilitator is a statutorily defined and protected function under the Protected Disclosures Act.
Dr Corcoran has served in Garda operations and investigations for 25 years and was appointed to an expert steering group on the Ethics Steering Committee that introduced a Code of Ethics into An Garda Síochána.
He holds a doctorate in Criminal Justice, as well as several other qualifications in policing, protected disclosures, mediation and ethics.
The Code of Ethics is mandatory for all gardaí since 2017. It states: "Everyone who works for the Garda Síochána is responsible for challenging and reporting wrongdoing".
It imposes a positive duty on every Garda to oppose "unprofessional, unethical, illegal, or corrupt behaviour" and says that senior managers "must support, encourage and facilitate speaking up and reporting wrongdoing at every level in the organisation."
Following procedure
Ms Sweeney was one of a few selected ‘protected disclosure managers’ who made decisions on protected disclosures, including assessing them, determining whether an examination or investigation should be carried out on foot of them, and deciding whether a case should be closed or should remain open.
Until she resigned that role in July 2025, she handled over 40 cases, some of them the most sensitive in the organisation.
They included whistleblowing files related to the Firearms Section at Garda headquarters, which issues, stores and repairs guns, weapons and accessories for use by the force.
On this and other issues in the documentary, An Garda Síochána said that it "is generally precluded by law from commenting on or addressing in detail on persons named in reports, and the contents and issues arising within protected disclosures."
Whistleblowers now unpaid
Ms Sweeney began working in An Garda Síochána in 2010, introducing a system of case management for juvenile offenders into the Gardaí.
She became Head of Community Engagement, a post that gave her national responsibility for community policing, diversity and integration, the Garda Reserve, offender management, and crime prevention.
As head of the Garda National Youth Diversion Bureau, she is graded at the civil service level of principal officer, which is equivalent to a chief superintendent rank.
Although both she and Dr Corcoran are still formally attached to their permanent positions, they each took annual leave, followed by stress-related sick leave, from the organisation as a result of medical advice.
They are both currently still out of the workplace, on unpaid sick leave and dependent on ‘illness benefit’ social welfare payments.
An Garda Síochána made no comment on the situation the two whistleblowers now find themselves in.
Potemkin process
The whistleblowers allege that sensitive cases were effectively, suppressed.
Dr Corcoran said that he believed that the protected disclosure process, if it were focused on legal compliance, is an effective process.
However, he said the process now in place in the Gardaí is not.
"There is a Potemkin process that has been set up", he said. "It would seem that there is all of the trappings of a correct process, but instead, what's been applied is a process that is more concerned with reputational management and risk aversion, than legal compliance."
RTÉ Investigates: The Gardaí - Full Disclosure from reporter Rita O'Reilly and producer/director John Cunningham is broadcast on 16 September at 9.35pm on RTÉ One and RTÉ Player.