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Crooked cops, crooked country... cead mile failures, welcome to Ireland.

Apparently the whole country, from the Taoiseach to the tea lady, is furious at the outcome of the Sean FitzPatrick trial.

Even mature adults who have lived their lives in the Nigeria of the northern hemisphere are supposedly surprised the case has collapsed.

Granted, it did come as a bit of a shock to learn vital evidence was actually shredded by the body bringing the prosecution.

But let’s face it, how many times in the past have major trials involving well-connected people collapsed through inexplicable circumstances?

In a country where the police college is embroiled in a money laundering scandal involving alleged offshore bank accounts why is anyone surprised by anything?

I have to be very careful here as the former Anglo boss has been acquitted of all charges.

His bank may have cost the taxpayer €40billion, brought about mass unemployment and emigration but Mr FitzPatrick did absolutely no wrong in the eyes of the law.

(Image: Leah Farrell/RollingNews.ie)

His former bank may have laid low the Irish economy but Seanie can walk with his head held high.

This week we found the corporate affairs watchdog – the Office of the Director of Corporate Enforcement – which botched the handling of Sean FitzPatrick’s criminal case is actually a neutered toy poodle.

This was to be the trial of the century and the public had hoped they might get answers as to how this bank caused so much misery to so many and why no one was held to account.

We will now never known because Kevin O’Connell, a legal advisor to the Office of the Director of Corporate Enforcement, shredded vital documents.

(Image: Collins Photo Agency)

We will never know why the documents were destroyed because there is no Garda investigation because that’s the way things are done in Ireland.

Similarly the public was denied the right to know why Financial Regulator Patrick Neary stood back and allowed Anglo and the other banks to engage in the skullduggery and malpractices which led to the financial crash.

Irish soccer fans used to have a chant which went something like, “Here we go, here we go, here we go.” Where white-collar crime is concerned it’s, “Here we go again.”

Don’t be fooled by the mock shock from the great and the good. For decades they have made sure corporate crime was not taken seriously.

Way back in 2014 leading barrister Remy Farrell, a specialist in white-collar crime, pointed out the State’s regulatory agencies were so stretched by an “endemic” lack of resources many reports of corporate crime were not even being read by the authorities.

He stated it was a “scandal” investigators were “at breaking point” due to the lack of

investment allowing large-scale fraud to go undetected, costing the State millions in lost revenue.

He said: “There is now one forensic accountant working in the principal law enforcement regulatory body in this country,” adding: “It’s enough to make the tin-pot dictator of a banana republic blush.”

I’ve said it before but this country is even more corrupt than Nigeria and Zimbabwe. In 2015 the Social

Democrats called for an independent anti-corruption agency similar to the ones in other EU states but their proposals were voted down by Fine Gael and Labour.

(Image: Gareth Chaney Collins)

Now in the wake of the collapse of the Sean FitzPatrick trial Simon Coveney is promising to establish such an agency if he becomes Taoiseach.

The reality is the main political parties did not want a corporate watchdog with teeth especially when the brown envelopes were flying like confetti.

The State established the Criminal Assets Bureau to go after ordinary crooks but why have they never gone after the white-collar

criminals?

If the well-connected are unlucky enough to be exposed they face a tribunal which can only make findings.

Imagine, three decades of tribunals which exposed a country more corrupt than any banana republic, yet only one conviction because of corruption.

Isn’t it strange those now calling for anti-corruption agencies don’t want to hear about the Moriarty Tribunal and SiteServ is a sight for sore eyes.

Hundreds of millions of euro has been stashed away by corporate crooks in the wake of the crash.

Not a cent has been recovered by the State and much of the loot has had to be paid for by the taxpayer.

But then again, when the laundry at the Garda Training College was

allegedly being used to launder money why should we be surprised?