RTÉ's North-East Correspondent Richard Dowling assesses the evidence heard in the Smithwick Tribunal since 1 September.
Since its return on 1 September, the Smithwick Tribunal has heard a lot of evidence relating to former Detective Sergeant Owen Corrigan – one of the three gardaí it is investigating to see if they leaked information to the IRA which led to the murder of two senior RUC officers.
Much of the evidence has been pretty uncomplimentary to the former garda but he did receive one strong vote of confidence – from a most surprising source too.
The key issue for Judge Peter Smithwick is whether Mr Corrigan or the other former sergeants, Leo Colton and Finbarr Hickey alerted the IRA to the presence of RUC Chief Supt Harry Breen and Supt Bob Buchanan to a meeting in Dundalk Garda Station on 20 March, 1989.
The two RUC men died minutes after leaving the Station in an IRA ambush.
Since the resumption of the Tribunal we have heard that Mr Corrigan was barred from entering Drogheda Garda Station which is quite simply incredible for a man who was one of the most senior gardaí in the division at the time.
While there seems little doubt Mr Corrigan was involved in buying and selling second hand cars while he was in the force, senior gardaí believed he was actually involved in smuggling them too although there was no evidence offered to back that up.
That's a very serious allegation to make against a garda, especially one in the border area at that time as it has been pointed out on several occasions major smuggling couldn't take place without the nod of approval from the Provisional IRA.
Judge Smithwick also heard that customs officers conducting a surveillance operation in Swanlinbar in Co Cavan were waiting for a major smuggling operation to take place and were going to intercept it.
However, a car was seen driving the road four times leading them to believe it was acting as a look out. That car turned out to be the personal car of Mr Corrigan although its driver could not be identified.
And as well as the four breaches of garda discipline for the unauthorised taking of a garda car, Mr Corrigan had been due to stand trial in Dundalk on a charge of insurance fraud.
It arose from an accident in Dunleer, Co Louth in 1988 where a lorry driven by Patrick Gallagher collided with a car and trailer being driven by Mr Corrigan.
Mr Gallagher who lived in south Armagh received several phone calls telling him not to attend and was eventually 'persuaded' when a group of men stopped him while driving and told him he would not go to court to give evidence. He didn't.
One of those whom he said had phoned him was a Francie Tiernan. A garda report read out to the Tribunal said he was involved in IRA activity, smuggling and property scams but was also a close associate of Mr Corrigan. Counsel for the former garda, Jim O'Callaghan, said his client will deny any involvement in this.
There were two attempts to move Mr Corrigan from Dundalk to other less sensitive locations but they both failed – the last one when he went sick and eventually retired from the Garda Siochana.
But another bizarre incident took place in December 1995, after he had left the force. Mr Corrigan and Mr Tiernan were abducted by the IRA from a hotel carpark in Drogheda and kept for two or three days.
Mr Corrigan was very badly beaten but both were eventually released. Neither would make a complaint to the gardaí although Mr Corrigan said he was beaten to find out details of those supplying information to the gardaí.
It has to be said that none of this directly points to him passing information to the IRA which led to the murders of the two RUC men.
So why is the Tribunal hearing it? Well, the answer it seems is that it is building a picture of Mr Corrigan and how he operated – particularly in relation to his alleged smuggling and any links to the IRA that could arise from that.
It must be stressed that the allegations of smuggling have not been put to Mr Corrigan in public session but it is to be expected that he will strenuously deny them.
But despite all this very negative evidence there has also been some very interesting evidence which could be seen to be in Mr Corrigan's favour.
The first arose when the Tribunal decided to go into private session to hear about telephone tapping. Before the media were put out, Judge Smithwick outlined that the evidence would relate to a tap on the phone of a senior IRA man in the border area.
It would seem that a garda operation to search his house and find a forged passport was compromised when a phone call was made to the man alerting him to the upcoming search.
Judge Smithwick clearly pointed out that Mr Corrigan was not a serving member at this time as he was on sick leave.
He couldn't therefore have known this operation was underway and not have passed on the information. If he didn't who did?
And secondly, despite earlier evidence that the RUC had serious worries about Mr Corrigan, a former RUC Assistant Chief Constable gave strong evidence in support of him.
Witness 27 was at one time head of the Special Branch in Newry and effectively admitted to the Tribunal that the RUC ran clandestine operations in the Republic. He'd described Mr Corrigan as a garda source and said senior RUC officers knew he was meeting him regularly.
The witness introduced Mr Corrigan to another source he had in Dundalk on a number of occasions but one day as they arrived a rendezvous point Mr Corrigan saw a number of cars belonging to republicans in the area where they were to meet.
He shouted a warning and they sped off never to meet that source again.
Witness 27 had no doubt that Mr Corrigan saved their lives that day. An impressive witness, the former RUC chief said he had no doubt about the garda and said he trusted him with his life.
And as well as confirming that the RUC had operations in the Republic, this witness also proved interesting on the long held mantra that the IRA got nothing significant from the bodies of the two slain RUC men.
Chief Supt Breen's diary was taken and it contained a list of phone numbers but with no names.
The night of the killing, the witness said he received phone calls at his home asking 'who was this?' He didn't answer but had his ex-directory phone number changed. Within hours the IRA had his new number, home address and car registration number.
That information could only have come from someone working for the IRA within in the civil service in the North. It led to the sixth and final attempt on his life by the IRA. After it failed he was moved to England.
No doubt the Smithwick Tribunal is likely to hear more evidence from former gardai and RUC officers in the coming days but we've yet to hear from the 'star' witnesses; Kevin Fulton, also known as Peter Keeley who said he was a British Army agent in the IRA in Dundalk and Ian Hurst, a man who worked for British Army intelligence during the time of the murders. Their evidence is likely to be crucial to everyone.
