Another employee, Anne McHardy, returned to her office after a day off to find it had been disturbed. She spotted a discarded pair of surgical gloves in the wastepaper basket. She made inquiries and on 6 April 2004 the secretary of the credit union, Vincent Walsh, wrote to her on behalf of the board:

"The chairman carried out a search of the credit-union offices on behalf of the gardai who are involved in sourcing the author of the document, " he wrote.

Not so, according to the cops. The following month, superintendent Joe Sullivan told the local Anglo Celt newspaper that there was no crime reported to the gardai in relation to Cavan credit union and he emphasised that the gardai do not ask members of the public to carry out searches on their behalf.

That wasn't the end of it. Four days after that publication, McHardy's boss, Helen O'Reilly, wrote to her.

"An appointment has been arranged with Dr James Maguire, the department of psychiatry at Our Lady's Hospital, Co Meath, for you to attend on Wednesday 7 July 2004. Any expenses incurred by you in attending this can be submitted to this office."

The letter was bizarre. McHardy hadn't sought an appointment through a GP or by any other means. She had been out of work for a number of weeks with work-related stress, which, she says, began with the incident in March, but she didn't have any issues that warranted an appointment with a psychiatrist.

Normally, such referrals are made by a GP.

McHardy inquired into who was referring her to a shrink. In reply to a letter from her solicitor, Maguire explained his role.

"Looking at my records, I have no initial written referral but I do have a letter from the manager referring to the appointment and advising me that I was to forward my report to Dr Faulkner [the credit union doctor)."

He added that it was not unusual to receive an initial referral by phone and that under no circumstances would he have attended her without her full and expressed consent.

Dr Patrick Faulkner confirmed in writing to McHardy that he had never met, examined her or referred her to anybody.

Who exactly made the initial referral, or why the credit-union manager was writing to a psychiatrist, remains unclear.

McDwyer and Helen O'Reilly refused to discuss the issue.