By Paddy Clancy

The IRA killers of Detective Jerry McCabe claim there is a deliberate state policy barring them from temporary overnight releases from jail to spend time with their families.

The four men jailed seven years ago are due for release, with remission, at various stages inside the next three years.

It is customary in Ireland when prisoners are coming to the end of their term that they be granted short terms outside as part of a program for reintegration with society.

But the “McCabe 4” -- Kevin Walsh, Michael O’Neill, Pearse McAuley and Jeremiah Sheehy -- say a total of 30 different requests between them to the governor of Castlerea Prison in Co. Roscommon, for temporary release have been turned down since 2004.

Their lawyer, Patrick Gageby, told Mr. Justice John McMenamin in the High Court in Dublin that the men are convinced there is a deliberate policy to deprive them of the temporary releases to which they believe they are entitled.

Gageby told the judge, in an application seeking permission on behalf of the men to challenge the state at a later full hearing, that they want a declaration that the repeated refusals of temporary release since 2004 is “capricious, arbitrary” and an “unjust exercise of the powers of the governor and the Minister for Justice Michael McDowell.”

They also want a declaration that they are entitled to have their temporary release requests reconsidered.

They claim they have been singled out without any objective justification for exclusion from proper consideration for temporary release.

The men were sentenced to prison terms ranging between 11 and 14 years for the manslaughter of McCabe, who was gunned down during an attempted post office robbery at Adare, Co. Limerick, 10 years ago.

The prosecution abandoned murder charges -- which would automatically have carried life sentences on conviction -- when a main witness declined to give evidence.

There has been a strong campaign, led by McCabe’s widow Ann, against early release for the men who failed to win freedom under the terms of the Good Friday Agreement which secured the early release of other Republican prisoners.

In this week’s High Court action 45-year-old Walsh, of Patrickswell, Co. Limerick, said that prior to January 2004 he had secured temporary release four times, but since then he was given six refusals when he applied to spend time with his family at Christmas and Easter.

His last application, five weeks ago, was turned down when he asked to be permitted visit his 86-year-old father who was ill in hospital. Grounds given for the rejection were that insufficient medical evidence was provided on his father’s condition.

O’Neill said that until April 2004 he was granted 10 temporary releases to visit family and sick relatives and for his daughter’s Confirmation. Since then he has been turned down 12 times, including his most recent request to visit his 82-year-old sick mother.

Sheehy said that although granted five temporary releases, he was refused for his son’s Confirmation in 2001 and his daughter’s Holy Communion three years ago. In addition, four applications for release at Christmas and Easter were refused since 2004.

McCauley said he was granted six temporary releases, but his last eight applications made since January 2004 were turned down.

The judge granted the men leave to bring separate legal challenges and the matter will come before the court again on December 19.