Nama trial hears Stormont rules subverted to 'embarrass' Peter Robinson

Independent

20-05-2025

The rules of a Stormont committee were subverted in 2015 to cause 'political embarrassment' to former first minister Peter Robinson, a court has heard.
The trial of loyalist activist Jamie Bryson, former Sinn Fein MLA Daithi McKay and Thomas O'Hara on charges related to a committee hearing that examined the sale of the National Asset Management Agency's (Nama) Northern Ireland assets got under way on Tuesday.
DUP chairman Lord Morrow was among the witnesses who gave evidence on the first day of the trial at Belfast Crown Court.
McKay, 43, of Loughan Road, Dunnamanagh denies committing misconduct in public office.
Bryson, 35, from Rosepark, Donaghadee, and O'Hara, 40, from Lisnahunshin Road, Cullybackey, both deny conspiring to commit misconduct in public office.
The charges relate to Bryson's 2015 appearance before the Stormont committee, chaired by McKay, which was investigating the sale of the Nama's Northern Ireland assets to a US investment fund.
A criminal probe was launched after the publication of leaked Twitter messages between Bryson, McKay and the account of O'Hara, who at the time was a Sinn Fein activist in north Antrim.
McKay quit as an MLA within hours of the Twitter messages being published in August 2016.
The Stormont Finance Committee inquiry was set up in 2015 amid political controversy over the multimillion-pound sale of Nama's property portfolio north of the border.
Nama, the so-called bad bank created by the Irish government to deal with the toxic loans of bailed-out lenders during the economic crash, sold its 800 Northern Ireland-linked properties to investment fund Cerberus for £1.2 billion.
Giving evidence to the committee in 2015, Bryson used Assembly privilege to name former DUP leader Mr Robinson as a beneficiary of the sale.
The then-first minister of Northern Ireland strongly rejected any suggestion he benefited from the deal. All other parties involved in the transaction also denied wrongdoing.
Opening the case on Tuesday, prosecuting barrister Toby Hedworth KC said it concerned a 'successful attempt to subvert the rules of procedure of a Stormont committee'.
He said the purpose of this had been to cause 'considerable political embarrassment' to Mr Robinson and others.
He said: 'Those very rules of procedure had been decided by the committee to protect a very substantial police enquiry into just the sort of corruption that these defendants were seeking to allege.
'That is why, say the prosecution, this went way beyond what can be deemed acceptable and had the potential to place that police inquiry at risk.'
The barrister said the finance committee had taken a public vote on how the loyalist activist's evidence would be heard, but were 'unaware that McKay and Bryson, assisted by Mr O'Hara, were secretly working together to subvert those very rules'.
Mr Hedworth said they had engaged in 'deliberate subterfuge'.
The barrister continued: 'This trial concerns how Mr Bryson's evidence came to be presented to this particular committee, which was aware from his initial communications that his evidence had the potential to stray outwith the carefully-crafted terms of reference and trespass into the realms of the ongoing NCA (National Crime Agency) investigation.
'This particular committee adopted a democratic procedure to decide whether that evidence would be presented in private or public session.
'It is the prosecution's case that by engaging in this subterfuge to allow Mr Bryson to make allegations that he well knew did not come within the terms of reference of the committee, Daithi McKay, as a public office holder was wilfully misconducting himself to such a degree as to amount to an abuse of the public trust in the office holder's position and it was done without reasonable excuse or justification.
'Mr McKay had contrived how evidence would be given in public session when it should have been given in private session, and allowed it to happen when he had the knowledge of what was to be said.
'Via his agreement with Mr Bryson, there was a conspiracy to allow that to happen with Mr O'Hara being a vital and knowing cog in the wheel.'
The first witness in the trial was the Sammy Morrison, who at the time was the PA to TUV leader Jim Allister.
He told the court that in August 2016, he had received a phone call from Bryson telling him he would forward emails containing Twitter messages between the loyalist activist and McKay which were going to be the basis of a story on the Nolan Show the following day.
Mr Morrison said the messages were then sent to him by Bryson via emails and after reading some of them, he forwarded the messages to Mr Allister.
The witness said he had subsequently given permission for a PSNI officer to retrieve the emails from his computer.
He was asked if it was widely known that Peter Robinson was going to be named by Bryson during his committee appearance.
Mr Morrison said: 'I think everybody knew that when Jamie was coming to give evidence before the committee that he intended to name Mr Robinson.
'I don't think that was limited to myself and Jim (Allister) because we had our meetings with Mr Bryson, I think that was common knowledge.
'Everybody was sitting watching the evidence waiting for that moment to arrive.'
DUP chairman Lord Morrow told the trial that he had written to the PSNI chief constable in August 2016 after allegations relating to Bryson and McKay were reported in the media.
He said he asked the police to consider if any criminal activity had taken place.
Lord Morrow was later asked if it was fair to say Stormont committees were 'not too strict' on the application of terms of reference in its hearings.
He said: 'Very often the strictness rests with the chairman… there were times I thought it could have been stricter.'
The non-jury trial resumes on Wednesday.