As editor of Blather,media consultant, and a contributor to Fortean Times , the author could no longer have a quiet drink without someone telling him their ghost stories.

 

The Confabulous Mind
An investigator of the paranormal searches out human memory

by Daev Walsh

Ed: Do you own a video camera?
Renee: No. Fred hates them.
Fred: I like to remember things my own way.
Ed: What do you mean by that?
Fred: How I remembered them. Not necessarily the way they happened.

–*Lost Highway*

A few years ago, while having dinner with a friend in my Dublin city centre apartment, I witnessed what I perceived to be an outrageously serious crime. Hearing activity outside my second story window, I looked out to see four Garda (police) officers running towards my building, their car parked askew, doors open. They split into two pairs, a duo disappearing up a side street, while the others continued towards my window, below which stood a man, dressed in a jogging suit and cap. He did not put up any resistance as he was handcuffed and led towards the car. They were about halfway there when the other two guards arrived from behind, having presumably covered potential methods of escape. As they drew level, one of them landed a punch on the back of the captive's head, knocking him on his face to the ground. The guards dragged him into the car, and drove away at high speed.

I was left standing at my window, shocked and disturbed by what I had seen. Gathering my wits, I decided that I had to do *something*. As a researcher and hesitant debunker of the paranormal, I was familiar with the fragility of recalled experience, so I decided to document the situation as quickly as possible. It had all happened too quickly to photograph, but within twenty minutes, I had typed up an account. My reasoning was that if it was required of me, I had a *document* that I could confidently refer to as being *my* perceptions of that night. This document became my official statement, as presented to the police, when through a series of letters between the Garda Commissioner and the Minister for Justice, I managed to file an official complaint with the Garda Complaints Board, an institution created so that the Gardai can investigate themselves - a system which understandably has its critics.

After months of letters and interviews with senior officers, I received a curt letter from the Complaints Board, informing me that 'neither an offence or a breach of discipline on the part of any member of complained of has been disclosed'. I replied, enquiring as to whether this meant that the reported event had not taken place (i.e., was I lying or delusional?), or if it had, were they telling me that it wasn't a crime to knock a handcuffed, unresisting prisoner to the ground with a blow to the back of the head? Did they accept my claim, but couldn't find any more evidence to corroborate it?

 

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