Police deny Omagh statement claim

Six families are taking the case

Surveillance officers tracking the movements of a man accused of the Omagh bombing have denied consulting together before making statements.

A lawyer for Michael McKevitt claimed gardai failed to keep written notes or photographs of alleged meetings.

A £14m civil action, which moved from Belfast to Dublin on Monday, is being taken by six families against five men.

The barrister said it was obvious officers had memorised undated statements for the hearing.

The statements were said to have been made after Michael McKevitt's arrest for terrorist offences in January 2001.

Unprecedented

McKevitt, the alleged leader of the Real IRA, Liam Campbell, Colm Murphy, Seamus McKenna and Seamus Daly, all deny involvement in the explosion which killed 29 people, including a woman pregnant with twins, in the Tyrone town in August 1998.

On day 19 of the unprecedented case, which has heard four weeks of evidence in Belfast Crown Court, members of the Garda Surveillance Unit said they witnessed McKevitt and FBI agent David Rupert together at a Dundalk housing estate on 18 February 2000.

The accuracy of testimonies given by Detective Garda Fergal O'Brien and Sergeant Seamus Lynch, who maintained they each saw the men in the cul-de-sac before and after a meeting in a house, were questioned by the lawyer.

They told the District Court that at no time did any officer consider video recording or photographing the meeting, did not log times or car registration numbers, or note the clothes McKevitt was wearing.

Earlier on Tuesday, a British judge made history when he temporarily presided in the Dublin courtroom to hear submissions from counsel for the defendants.