The first shoot-to-kill victims
14 November, 2002 --
On the night of 11 November 1982, two young IRA
volunteers, Eugene Toman and Sean Burns were sitting in
another volunteer, Gervais McKerr's house in Lurgan, County
Armagh, drinking tea, and waiting for a lift to a safe
house. The atmosphere was friendly and relaxed, according to
a girl in the McKerr house that night, with the lads joking
as usual and enjoying the company. Within a few hours, the
three volunteers would be dead, tirst victims of an horrific
shoot-to-kill policy by the RUC.
The fact that this was a planned assassination operation was
vehemently denied by the British government and the RUC at
the time. The RUC claimed that McKerr, Burns and Toman had
being speeding through a road-block when they had opened
fire on the car. This point was later disputed as a result
of the forensic and medical evidence at the scene of the
deaths of the three men.
Gervais, Eugene and Sean were valued members of the IRA and
were respected and admired by their friends and neighbours,
as the enormous turnout at their funerals showed. They were
mourned deeply by their families. Sean and Eugene were just
21 years of age, and Gervais (30) had a wife of ten years,
Eleanor, and two children. Gervais was primarily a family
man, who was considered easy-going and kind. He was
multi-talented and was a keen photographer as well as an
expert handyman. Eugene and Sean were friends since
childhood, and in republican terms were considered
dedicated, fearless and resourceful. Socially, they both
enjoyed life to the full; both were interested in
traditional music and Eugene was a talented artist. Eugene,
at the time of his death, had been going with Colette Gaskin
for six years and the young couple were due to get engaged.
The version of events given by the RUC on that night is that
Gervais McKerr's green Ford Escort, which was well known to
them, had approached a checkpoint that they had set down at
the junction of the old Portadown Road and Tullagally Road
East, initially slowed down and then accelerated through the
checkpoint, knocking down an RUC man in the process and
slightly injured him, (so slightly that the man needed no
hospital treatment). The RUC claimed they pursued the car
for some time before opening fire on it.
However, all the evidence found disagreed with the RUC's
account.
In the immediate aftermath of the shooting, the RUC cordoned
off the area where the car eventually crashed for five
hours, and physically restrained the local priest, Fr.
Poland, from administering the last rights to the men. This
information is even more horrific in the light of subsequent
medical evidence which found that backseat passenger Sean
Burns may well have died from shock and loss of blood over a
period of time, rather than from his initial wound, a one
bullet shot to the side of his body.
Forensic evidence was also at odds with the RUC's version of
events. Firstly, it was established that the RUC had fired
roughly 109 bullets, and that the majority of these were
fired into the bodywork of the car on the driver's side.
Only five of the bullets had in fact been fired into the
bodywork at the back of the car, which is precisely where
the majority of the bullets should have gone if in fact they
had been fired at a fleeing car. Secondly, medical evidence
revealed that Eugene Toman had received most of his
injuries, not in the back or the side, but in the chest. His
body, when found, lay half way out of the car, as though he
was trying to escape the onslaught of bullets.
Further to the forensic and medical evidence were the
reports of witnesses, some of which said that they had seen
no checkpoint on the road, but had in fact seen an unmarked
RUC vehicle parked in a lay-by along Tullygally Road East
from 7pm, and that of a man who when listening to RUC
messages on his radio heard exchanges about 'three suspects'
in a 'green car', and orders given to follow 'our three
friends'.
Other evidence, such as that from a doctor who examined the
bodies at the scene and believed that Eugene's body had been
moved to accommodate the RUC's story (the new position
didn't tally with the photos taken by the RUC 30 minutes
before the doctor arrived) added to the belief that the RUC
had either ambushed the men and shot them, or did stop them
at a checkpoint and allowed them to proceed before shooting
them.
Three of the RUC men were tried and acquitted of the three
men's murders.
The coroner appointed to the case afterwards could not
gather enough evidence to state exactly how the men were
killed and Sean's father says that they received a death
certificate with nothing on it.
Ten years after their deaths, the inquest was reopened. The
ill-fated Stalker inquiry began, and brought into the open a
range of official lies and false evidence. The protracted
delay of inquests into killings by British crown forces is
one of a wide range of practices in the Six Counties, which
human rights groups and legal representatives have
highlighted as restrictive and detrimental. At this time
also, the replacing at inquests of 'verdicts' with
'findings' was slammed by families seeking justice.
The trial indicated the lengths the RUC had gone through to
cover up what really happened the night of the three men's
deaths.
As was so often the case in disputed killings, one injustice
soon led to another. John Stalker, senior officer in the
greater Manchester police, was sent over to investigate the
shoot-to-kill incidents. When it was clear that his report
would expose serious and criminal wrongdoing by the crown
forces, a cover-up began at the highest level. Stalker
himself became a victim of what many believe was a dirty
tricks campaign and was taken off the case, his work
discredited.
Stalker had concluded in his investigation that Special
Branch had played a central role in the direction and
carrying out of shoot-to-kill incidents, although his
report, nor the version produced by his replacement , Colin
Sampson, was never published
Twenty years on, and the families of the three men are still
seeking justice. Sean's father is still angry that the
families have yet to receive any acknowledgement from the
British government.
"We've had no satisfaction," he said. "Initially, we went
with another solicitor who wasn't pushing the case at all,
so eventually we transferred to Madden & Finucane, which has
taken the case to the European courts but still can't get
justice. We are still grieving. The lads were ambushed, it's
clear for anyone to see, but I don't think we'll ever get an
acknowledgement form the British government."
Earlier this year, the family of Gervais McKerr was granted
leave in the High Court to apply for Judicial Review against
then Secretary of State John Reid for his failure to provide
an effective investigation into McKerr's death.
Solicitor for the family, Peter Madden of Madden and
Finucane said:
"This case is the first of many that will test the failure
of the British government to provide proper public inquiries
into the deaths of hundreds of people killed by British
crown forces. The European Court of Human Rights ruled last
May that the current legal process for public inquiry (the
coroner's inquest) was in violation of Article 2 of the
European Convention on Human Rights (the right to life).
Even though this judgement was delivered in May of last
year, so far the British government has not told any of the
families how they intend to comply with the ruling. It is
clear to us that the only chance the McKerr family have of
receiving the type of effective investigation, that the
European Court has said they are entitled to, is for an
independent judicial public inquiry to be established
immediately."
In another attack, on Wednesday 24 November 1982,
17-year-old North Armagh youth, Michael Tighe became the
fourth fatality of the RUC's shoot-to-kill policy. The
shooting was another deliberate planned attack involving
three carloads of RUC men, not a routine patrol, on a shed
on the Ballinary Road where Michael and a friend of his,
20-year-old Martin McAuley were shot down. Three rifles were
claimed to be subsequently found on the premises, though
none of them had been fired. The youths were given no
opportunity to surrender, and the RUC shot at the shed for
up to four minutes. The two young men had been legitimately
on the premises, and a witness later stated that it was dark
and would have been almost impossible for the RUC to see
what they were firing at.
Within minutes of the killing being announced, local DUP
Assembly member David Calvert was expressing full backing
for, and satisfaction with, the RUC action.
On Sunday, 12 December, INLA members Roddy Carroll and
Seamus Grew became the fifth and sixth victims in North
Armagh of the RUC's new shoot-to-kill policy. The pair were
unarmed when they were gunned down by the special undercover
RUC unit. As in the case of the three IRA Volunteers the
previous month, the crown forces claimed that the pair had
accelerated through a checkpoint at Girvan's Bridge on the
Armagh to Keady Road, injuring an RUC man. The RUC claimed
the men were shot after a chase that went on for several
miles, butt an eyewitness reported that Seamus Grew had
waved at him as he passed him on the Killylea Road. He
estimated that the car was doing no more than 30 mph. He
reported that an RUC car travelling at high speed caught up
with and ovewrtook Grew's car. He did not see what happened
next but heard a burst of gunfire, followed by two single
shots. Both men were later found to have been shot three
times, in the arm, the chest, and the back of the head.
Ronnie Flanagan, the former Chief Constable of the PSNI, was
during the 1980s Detective Chief Inspector of the
Headquarters Mobile Support Units, or HMSUs, which were
involved in a number of the controversial shoot-to-kill
incidents.
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