Madden & Finucane
Ranked
Number 1
by Chambers,
the clients guide
to the legal profession
Chambers and Partners have been publishing their
world-famous guides to the legal profession since 1990. The key to the success
of their legal directories and the validity of their awards is the in-depth,
unbiased research conducted by their team of highly qualified and experienced
researchers. View more
Madden & Finucane
present
the Madden & Finucane
and Pat Finucane
Aisling Awards
The Aisling Bursaries, launched in March 2000, are
an educational initiative between Belfast Media Group and West Belfast
Partnership. The Aisling Bursaries are designed to help students defray their
education and training costs.
View
more
|
|
Shoot-to-kill inquest calls
02 June 2010 --
A new inquest into the killing of Francis Bradley has been ordered by the
north’s newly appointed Attorney General. Francis Bradley was shot dead in
disputed circumstances by the British SAS near Toombridge, County Antrim in
February 1986.
The British soldiers who fired the fatal rounds were not required to give
evidence during an inquest held in 1987. RUC interviews with other members of
the unit were made available but potentially important intelligence evidence was
withheld.
Last week John Larkin instructed the coroner’s office to hold a second inquest
into the Bradley killing. The announcement came within hours of Larkin taking up
his office as the first Attorney General for the north in 37 years. Larkin’s
appointment followed the transfer of policing and justice powers and the
election of Minister for Justice, David Ford.
Announcing his decision, Larkin said although he had only taken up his post the
previous day, he was familiar with the case and had been able to read papers,
previously provided by the former British Attorney General Baroness Scotland.
Welcoming the Attorney General’s decision, the Bradley family said they had
waited more than 24 years to learn the truth and they were looking forward to
hearing the British soldiers who carried out the killing account for their
actions.
The family’s solicitor, Fearghal Shiels of Madden and Finucane, said that those
directly responsible for the death, who did not appear to give evidence at the
first inquest, are now, as a result of a change in the rules, compellable
witnesses and will be subject to questions by the family’s lawyers.
20-year-old Francis Bradley from Castledawson was alone, unarmed and posed no
possible threat when he was shot eight times in the back and head at close range
by an undercover British army unit. Initial reports falsely claimed the
20-year-old had been armed, in the company of other armed men and moving weapons
from a dump for the IRA.
The British army claimed that the soldiers who confronted Bradley shouted at him
and he turned on them in a threatening manner at which point they opened fire.
Forensic evidence established that the victim had been shot in the back, not in
the front as the soldiers’ claims implied.
Disputed circumstances
Between 1982 to 1991 there were at least 67 killings by British crown forces in
disputed circumstances, many of those involving shoot-to kill operations carried
out by undercover units such as the SAS and E4A.
Over a third of those killed were unarmed at the time while others were not in a
position to use weapons. Discovered IRA arms dumps became classic crown force
stakeouts but most often those killed were shot while unarmed, going towards
rather than coming away from a dump.
In the wake of such killings, it became commonplace for British forces to lie
about the circumstances often to cover the fact that they were engaging in
summary executions.
In later years misinformation was fed to the media via “unattributed” or
anonymous sources, immediately framing the incident most favourably for British
forces without actually involving them directly in lies.
In this way, British forces, even when the facts belied it, fed the myth of a
“clean kill” where death followed an armed encounter with the IRA in which a
British unit had “no choice” but open fire rather than make an arrest. Shooting
at close range unarmed “suspects” in the head and back does not “fit” into this
model of “legitimate” armed action.
Legal challenges
The decision by the Attorney General to order another inquest followed a series
of successful legal challenges by the families of those killed in disputed
circumstances.
In November 2007 a Belfast judge ruled that documents relating to the summary
execution of Bradley and two others must be surrendered to the coroner in the
event of a new inquest. The documents related to two shoot-to-kill operations
carried out by the British SAS and the third a collusion victim.
Daniel Doherty was one of two IRA Volunteers ambushed by the SAS in the grounds
of a hospital in Derry in 1984. Medical evidence showed six shots were fired
into Doherty as he lay on the ground. Both men had been shot in the head in a
classic SAS execution. Gerard Casey was shot dead by a British inspired death
squad in 1989.
An earlier judgement by British law lords ruled that the police were obliged to
give the coroner all documents in their possession relating to a death.
Last month an attempt by the PSNI to block a decision by senior coroner John
Leckey to allow next-of-kin limited access of secret reports into allegations of
shoot-to kill was over-turned in Belfast High Court.
Leckey had decided to allow the families of six people shot dead around Lurgan
and Armagh in 1982 “edited” access to an investigation carried out by senior
British policemen, John Stalker and Colin Stevens. The report has never been
published.
IRA Volunteers Eugene Toman, Sean Burns and Gervaise McKerr were shot dead by a
covert unit of the RUC in 1982. Michael Tighe was shot dead by the RUC within
the same month and INLA men Roddy Carroll and Seamus Grew were shot dead the
following month.
An application for a judicial review on behalf of the PSNI Chief Matt Baggott
said the reports should not be disclosed to relatives and that the coroner’s
determination would undermine applications for any public interest immunity
certificates, gagging orders often used by the police and state to withhold
information.
Presiding Judge Gillen upheld the coroner’s right to use his discretion. If
inquests are to maintain public confidence, said the judge, “it is vital to
ensure all interested parties can participate in an informed, open and
transparent fashion”.
The judge ruled that all parties must be allowed to participate on an equal
footing from the very outset of the process.
A statement released by the families’ solicitors welcoming the judgement urged
the Chief Constable to disclose the report without further delay.
“It is now over 15 years since this Inquest had to be abandoned by the Coroner
because of the then RUC Chief Constable Hugh Annesley’s refusal to disclose the
Stalker / Sampson’s report into the circumstances surrounding these killings.
The new Chief Constable should now disclose the report without further delay or
prevarication in order that the full truth can finally be established about
these events,” said Fearghal Sheils.
Commenting on the ruling, Sinn Féin Assembly member for Upper Bann John O’Dowd
said the families of those six men killed by the RUC in North Armagh in the
1980s had fought a long and difficult campaign for the truth.
“It is my hope that the Inquests will now proceed and what is seen by many as a
deliberate policy of delay and obstruction will come to an end. The families by
their determined actions over many years have shown that they will not be denied
the truth and they will not be denied justice,” he said.
|
|
more..
|
|
|