Osgur Breatnach, represented by Belfast firm KRW Law, has made an application to the court under section 9 of the Criminal Procedure Act 1993.

Mr Breatnach is one of the six men arrested and allegedly beaten by gardaí following the 1976 Sallins train robbery, alongside Michael Barrett, John Fitzpatrick, Nicky Kelly, Brian McNally and the late Michael Plunkett.

Convicted in the Special Criminal Court on the basis of what he alleges was a forced confession, Mr Breatnach ultimately succeeded in quashing his conviction on appeal in 1980.

However, his lawyers say he has never been fully exonerated due to the State’s failure to concede that his conviction was a miscarriage of justice.

There have been repeated calls for a statutory public inquiry into the Sallins case, but the government has said it does not believe there is any “urgent public interest” in an inquiry.

The Irish Council for Civil Liberties (ICCL) has said it is sending a legal observer to tomorrow’s hearing on behalf of a number of NGOs, including Amnesty International Ireland, the Committee on the Administration of Justice (CAJ), the Pat Finucane Centre and Fair Trials International.

Executive director Joe O’Brien said: “Osgur Breatnach and the Sallins Men have been fighting against allegations, abuse and wrongful convictions for almost 50 years.

“Although his conviction has been quashed, Osgur deserves to be fully exonerated and to have the conviction declared a miscarriage of justice.

“We now know that the human rights violations inflicted upon the Sallins Men by An Garda Síochána (specifically the ‘Heavy Gang’) and accepted by other parts of the Irish criminal justice system were part of a systemic pattern of human rights violations endemic across many years and cases perpetrated by members of the Garda.

“Nothing should be allowed to stand in the way of full justice and truth for the Sallins Men.”