Reprint of Sunday Times Article on Irish Parliament’s Maureen O’Sullivan’s Letter Asking 107 American Congresswomen For Support in Getting to the Bottom of the George Gibney Story
‘US lawmakers urged to release Gibney ’s files’ — Sunday Times of London
August 2, 2015Jimmy ‘Superfly’ Snuka Grand Jury Report Being Reviewed by Supervising Judge
August 3, 2015Below is the full text of the article in London’s Sunday Times. It is reprinted with permission. © Times Newspapers Limited 2015
Complete chronological links to Concussion Inc.’s Gibney series are at https://concussioninc.net/?p=10205.
US lawmakers urged to release Gibney’s files
By Justine McCarthy
2 August 2015
MAUREEN O’SULLIVAN, an independent TD, wants female members of America’s Senate and Congress to support a federal court petition to obtain the immigration file for George Gibney.
The former Irish national swimming coach has been living in America since 1995, since the Irish High Court ruled he should not be tried on 27 charges of raping and assaulting underage swimmers because of a time delay since the alleged incidents.
O’Sullivan, a Dublin Central TD, has written to more than 100 American women politicians asking them to support Irvin Muchnick, a sports journalist who is challenging the Department of Homeland Security under the Freedom of Information Act for withholding 98 pages of Gibney’s 102-page immigration file.
“George Gibney has never been brought to justice,” O’Sullivan said in the letter, written on Muchnick’s advice. “His victims and their loved ones continue to suffer horrifically, one of them dying tragically last Christmas. There are dozens of credible accounts of his long history of molesting children and athletes in his charge. He was one of a number of other coaches involved in this abuse; similar to what has emerged about USA Swimming. I believe there has been a litany of mistakes in relation to George Gibney.”
After O’Sullivan raised the issue in the Dail last March, Nóirín O’Sullivan, the garda commissioner, ordered a re-examination of the Gibney case, including complaints made by more swimmers after the prosecution collapsed. After this second investigation, the director of public prosecutions decided against applying for Gibney’s extradition from America.
In her letter, O’Sullivan said she was appealing on behalf of victims in a bid to achieve “justice for those so horribly abused” by Gibney.
“Can you support the calls for transparency from the federal executive agencies in telling precisely how George Gibney got into the United States in 1995 and how he has remained there since?” she said. “There are suggestions of intervention on his behalf by USA Swimming, or the American Swimming Coaches Association or both. I trust we can work together to get to the truth in order to bring about justice and some closure for abuse victims, in the hope they can finally move forward in their lives.”
Among the recipients of O’Sullivan’s letter are Nancy Pelosi, a former speaker of the House of Representatives, and Jackie Speier, a Californian Democratic congresswoman and her party’s spokeswoman on amateur sport.