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Ireland's political and cultural magazine
16 April-May 2025
April-May 2025 PB
The worst deth toll of the Troubles
NEWS
T
he Chirperson of the Omagh
Bombing Inquiry has decisively
written the late Laurence Rush, who
died in 2012, aged 70, into the story
of the Omagh Bomb. Lord Turnbull
acknowledged that Rush had intrepidly
questioned the security forces’ failings from
the earliest stage.
Addressing a commemorative hearing that
his tribunal hosted for victims, Lord Turnbull
called Rush “a campaigner for truth and
justice” who “from a very early stage sought
to cast light on the circumstances surrounding
the bombing by seeking information and
answers concerning previous attacks and
trying to learn what was known and what was
or what was not done. Laurence Rush was one
of the first to raise the questions which this
inquiry will seek to determine, and he was not
deterred from raising them loudly and publicly.
He was the first to issue legal proceedings
against the police and the British Government”.
Eventually, investigations by Northern
Ireland’s Police Ombudsman; failed criminal
trials on both sides of the border; and
investigative journalists’ work were to produce
evidence of knowledge of an attack beforehand
and of tainted investigations afterwards.
Rush endured a campaign of vilification
because of his stand. If they do so at all, many
only known him from the 2004 TV film 'Omagh'.
This portrayed him as cranky, and ignored his
dogged questioning of the State. The headline
Rush always insisted the Real IRA was
responsible for the bomb. From soon after the
Bombing, he had concerns as to why there
were no police on duty in Omagh town centre
on the day.
He was an intelligent, self-educated man
with a great interest in current aairs. Thus he
knew of human-rights barrister Michael
Mansfield, the “King of human rights work”,
according to ‘the Legal 500’. Mansfield had
represented those falsely convicted of the
IRA's Guildford and Birmingham pub
bombings, seeing him as someone who
would extract answers from the State. Rush
was always a man who did things directly. The
protocol is that clients are not supposed to
contact barristers. In true Rush style, he rang
Mansfield at his London chambers. Mansfield
was interested. Rush also brought Derry
human rights solicitor Des Doherty into the
case.
At the inquest in 2000, Mansfield
established that no police had been on duty
in the town centre on the afternoon of the
bomb. This has never been explained. Later
in 2000, BBC's flagship Panorama programme
named four men as the bombers. Rush went
to the Northern High Court attempting to get
this stopped. He feared it would prejudice any
trial, enabling the bombers to escape justice.
Rush was initially part of the civil action
against a number of men allegedly
responsible for the bombing. He became
increasingly concerned at the dangers of this
process. He believed investigating the
bombing and convicting the bombers was the
job of the security forces, not of a bunch of
relatives. Rush was also concerned at the role
of former IRA member and agent provocateur
Sean O'Callaghan, in the civil action, as
advisor, fund-raiser and publicist.
O'Callaghan had admitted to the 1985 killing
of low-level informer John Corcoran in Co Cork
when he had himself been a high-level
informer.
Rush withdrew from the civil action. A few
months later he was expelled from the Omagh
Support and Self-Help Group. This was largely
composed of those taking the civil action. It
was under-focused on the failures of the
security forces — though it has now changed
its position — and later faced allegations that
it was being over-charged by its London-
based legal team
In 2005 Rush served a writ on the North's
Chief Constable and Secretary of State. This
alleged their negligence had allowed the
bombing to take place. His action was
admitted, then struck out, then readmitted.
The stress took a toll on him. He suered a
stroke. After a period of ill-health he died in
2012. His family took over his legal action.
Evidence uncovered for his case is central to
the current inquiry.
Bold Rush
Unsung hero, Laurence Rush, pushed
effectively for truth of Omagh bombing
By Anon McCbe
on a 2010 Belfast Telegraph report “Blame
RIRA for your wife’s death” was typical of early
coverage. He was not mentioned in BBC
Northern Ireland's timeline of the Omagh
massacre, published as late as January this
year.
Rush's wife Elizabeth (Libbi) was killed by
the bomb. Her shop had been directly opposite
the spot where the bomb exploded. Her death
left him initially just angry, but then seeking
answers.
Speaking to the Inquiry on behalf of the
Rush family, his daughter Siobhán Rush said:
“Yet our father, Laurence, was unable to stay
silent because he knew that silence was a lie.
He took an original, controversial and unique
path in respect of his analysis of the events of
15 August 1998 long before others. He, with
his legal team, faced much criticism from
many, until the realisation dawned that our
father's unique and exceptional analysis of the
atrocity was a shocking reality, still to this day
hard for many to contemplate...”.
