Drew Harris and the continuing story of the bike

This might set the cat among the pigeons this week:
The Ditch has obtained a 2014 internal garda intelligence file naming Athlone-based gardaí accused of links with the drug trade
This week we will name these gardaí.

I don' think they were ever named.
An internal garda intelligence file named three Athlone gardaí suspected of involvement in the midlands drug trade.

County Westmeath ex-garda George Garvey and ex-detective Tom Higgins both kept their jobs despite intelligence linking them to organised crime in the midlands. 

A September 2010 garda internal report, seen by The Ditch, written by Athlone-based sergeant Andrew Haran claimed Garvey had “tipped-off” drug dealers in the midlands town and was in a relationship with a suspected heroin dealer with a number of criminal convictions. No action was taken against Garvey

In 2019 assistant garda commissioner Anne Marie McMahon recommended Garvey face a disciplinary board of inquiry to examine one of eight allegations of wrongdoing against him.

Assistant commissioner David Sheahan later overruled her recommendation and decided against the establishment of a board of inquiry because of flaws he claimed to have found in the initial internal disciplinary investigation. Garvey’s suspension was lifted in summer 2019 as a result of this decision.

It is understood that Garvey remained a member of An Garda Síochána until his retirement in 2021.

“Higgins owed money… for drugs” and this dealer “wanted payment. Higgins refused to pay stating that he wouldn't pay as he always looked after” this dealer, who “soon after… got a tip off that his home was to be searched… Higgins may have arranged this search to teach” the dealer “a lesson”, reads the report.

Higgins continued serving as a detective garda in Athlone station till his resignation last year. 

After speaking to The Ditch by phone yesterday for more than five minutes about his time as a garda in Athlone, The Ditch put extracts of the report to Higgins and asked for his response. 

The line went dead.