Retired gardai have today told the High Court that they refute allegations of intimidating key witnesses in the Ian Bailey case.

Retired garda Michael McCarthy this afternoon has denied as 'absolutely..not true' that a key witness in the Ian Bailey case was beaten up in the back of a patrol car and threatened with the IRA.

Mr Bailey is suing the State for alleged wrongful arrest over the 1996 murder of French film producer Sophie Toscan du Plantier.

Retired Garda Michael McCarthy was there when ex-British soldier Martin Graham was detained for a drugs search in Skibbereen in June 1997.

Mr Graham previously gave evidence that he was put in the back of a patrol car, beaten up and threatened with the provos because gardai feared he'd taped them corruptly offering him cannabis to get close to Ian Bailey.

In his evidence today Mr McCarthy insisted it was a run of the mill drugs search and he denied suggestions from Mr Bailey's lawyers that he'd 'put the frighteners' on Martin Graham.

The jury also heard from Garda Kevin Kelleher about the arrest of Ian Bailey's partner Jules Thomas at her home in Schull in February 1997.

He said the journey to the garda station was relaxed and normal and he denied there was any banging of tables or raised voices during her interviews.

Retired detective sergeant Maurice Walsh has denied that gardai put 'the frighteners' on a key witness in the Ian Bailey case.

Mr Bailey, a journalist, is suing the State and Garda Commissioner for alleged wrongful arrest on suspiscion of murdering French film maker Sophie Toscan du Plantier in West Cork in 1996.

In her evidence Schull shopkeeper Marie Farrell alleged that retired detective Maurice Walsh exposed himself to her in the toilets of Schull Golf Club in the summer of 1998.

In the witness box yesterday, the former sergeant said the allegation was an outrageous lie. 

Today under cross examination by lawyers for Ian Bailey he said when he first heard the claim he was 'shocked' and told an inquiry into the du Plantier investigation 'I never dropped my trousers.' 

He also denied putting the frighteners on another key witness Martin Graham who he described as a 'double crossing double agent'.

The former British soldier claims gardai gave him cannabis to befriend Ian Bailey.