The full story of the single greatest scandal in Irish policing history - from the journalist who brought it into the national arena.

When, in 2008, Sergeant Maurice McCabe complained of shoddy investigations into serious crime in County Cavan, nothing could have prepared him for what was in store.
A career garda, McCabe never set out to be a whistleblower. However, over the following eight years, he exposed gross incompetence and corruption within An Garda Siochána. It ranged from a violent criminal being free to murder, to country-wide corruption in the policing of road safety.
Along the way he paid a terrible price, enduring vilification, bullying and harassment by forces who wanted to silence him and his inconvenient truths. Worse still were the rumours of an extreme nature, which had a devastating effect on his whole family.
McCabe's actions ultimately led to some of the biggest reforms of An Garda Siochána since the foundation of the state, caused major political upheaval, and culminated in a Tribunal established in 2017, to examine whether there had been a smear campaign against him within the force.
A Force For Justice reveals the story behind the scenes, of one man struggling to survive in the most challenging of circumstances. It is a dramatic account of a garda sergeant's journey from a rural outpost into the heart of the Irish political and legal system.

Michael Clifford is Special Correspondent for the Irish Examiner. He has been working in print and broadcast journalism for over twenty years.

He is the author of three non-fiction books, including Bertie Ahern and the Drumcondra Mafia (with Shane Coleman) and two crime novels. In 2014, TV3's Tonight with Vincent Browne programme selected him as Journalist of the Year for his coverage of the garda whistleblower story. He was named the newspaper industry's Journalist of the Year in 2016.
He lives in Dublin.
@mickcliff