Freddie Scappaticci

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    Scappaticci, MI5 and the murder of a Westminster MP. The stench of death associated with the Kincora scandal is heady. By David Burke

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    The stench of death associated with the Kincora child sex abuse scandal is heady. It includes the murder of a Westminster MP by an MI5 agent inside the IRA. The murderous agent was Alfredo ‘Freddie’ Scappaticci. The victim was Robert Bradford, a member of the Ulster Unionist Party and the Vanguard Progressive Unionist Party. He represented Belfast South. The death of Scappaticci earlier this year shut the door on the last realistic opportunity to solve Bradford’s murder.  Operation Kenova, which has been probing the Scappaticci scandal for seven years, and has cost approximately €40,000,000, is unlikely now to establish what took place. The killing was linked to the cover-up of the Kincora Boys’ Home scandal. There are other murders which are associated with Kincora. One of the most significant Loyalist terrorists of the period 1968-82, was John McKeague, a paedophile. He knew all about Kincora. McKeague was murdered by British agents when he threatened to spill the beans on the scandal. William McGrath, who was the ‘housefather’ at Kincora, was a British agent. He was involved in the clandestine importation of arms for Loyalist terrorists, including his own paramilitary organisation, Tara. Many people were shot dead due to the arms smuggling efforts of British agents inside Loyalist paramilitary circles such as McGrath. The cascade of death connected to Kincora did not end with murder. Sex-abuse victims committed suicide. One Kincora boy took his life after being violated by Lord Louis Mountbatten. Rishi Sunak’s proposed legacy legislation, if passed, will help conceal the full extent of State-Loyalist collusion, some of which was linked to McGrath. 1. Honey Trap MI5 and MI6 ran a ‘honey trap’ operation at Kincora Boys Home, a residence in Belfast for boys, aged 14 years and upwards, in the 1970s. Residents were trafficked to Loyalist politicians and paramilitaries, as well as VIPs, for sexual abuse. Some were molested at the home, others at hotels such as the Europa, Girton Lodge and Park Avenue in Belfast, as well as the Queen’s Court in Bangor. ‘Kompromat’ or dirt was collected about politicians and paramilitaries. Some were blackmailed into working for the intelligence services. The British Establishment applied a double coat of whitewash over Kincora in an attempt to cover up the full extent of this scandal decades ago. A lot – but not all of it – has been peeled away by survivors, whistleblowers and obstinate truth-seekers. 2. Driven to suicide Eric Witchell is a paedophile. He now lives in London. In the 1970s he ran Williamson House in Belfast where he preyed on pre-pubescent boys and young teenagers. He and his accomplices drove at least three of them to commit suicide; another two to attempt it. A select few were transferred to Kincora when they reached 14. Witchell was not interviewed by any of the various inquiries into Kincora. Stephen Waring, one of the residents of Kincora, ran away from the home in November 1977, a few months after being abused by Lord Mountbatten at Classsiebawn, County Sligo. Waring made it as far as Liverpool where he was captured and put on the Ulster Monarch car ferry destined for Belfast. He never made it home. Apparently, he jumped overboard to his death. His body was never found. The Garda have retained the security logs which record the visitors to Classsiebawn in 1977  but have declined to disclose them to me and Andrew Lownie, Mountbatten’s biographer. They undoubtedly record the arrival of Joe Mains, the Warden of Kincora, in a vehicle with boys, including Waring, who was seated in the rear. I am frankly aghast that the Irish government – which could intervene – has no interest in helping the survivors of sex abuse committed in Sligo by ordering Garda Commissioner Drew Harris to release the security logs. 3. A dismembered child’s body in the Lagan Brian McDermott, aged 10, disappeared from Ormeau Park on 3 September 1973. Part of his dismembered and charred body was found in a sack in the River Lagan a week later. The RUC discovered evidence that he was abducted and murdered by Alan Campbell, a founding member of the DUP. Campbell was also in Tara, a Loyalist paramilitary organisation, and was a friend of the paedophiles who ran Kincora. Colin Wallace, who worked at the British Army’s HQ at Lisburn, has told Village that the British Army, which had an interest in Tara, was alerted by the RUC that they were about to arrest Campbell. Then, suddenly, the police were ordered to stand down. Only the Northern Ireland Office (NIO) possessed that sort of authority. The security apparatus of the NIO was run by MI5 and Ministry of Defence officials. The manoeuvre ensured that the Kincora ‘honey trap’ operation did not unravel at that time. Significantly, Campbell was a British agent. Authors Jack Holland and Henry McDonald, referred to him as the ‘Demon Preacher’ in their books, describing him as an obvious British agent. Campbell and his cabal are suspects in the abduction of four other Belfast boys whose bodies were never recovered: Jonathan Aven, age 14, who disappeared on 20 September 1969; David Leckey, aged 12, who went missing on 25 September 1969; Thomas Spence, age 11, and John Rogers, aged 13, who both vanished on 26 November 1974. Had the RUC been permitted to arrest Campbell, it is probable that young Spence and Rogers would still be alive today. The BBC commissioned a documentary about the disappearance of these boys. It was completed in 2021 and entitled, ‘The Lost Boys of Belfast’. It was intended to be broadcast in May 2021 but was pulled by management. It is not certain if it will ever be aired. It uncovered evidence of MI5 involvement in the protection of Campbell and the Kincora cabal. RUC officers went on record in front of the cameras. Campbell was not interviewed by any of the various inquiries into Kincora. 4. The gunrunning operations of the ‘housefather’ of Kincora, William McGrath Colin ‘Jay’ Wyatt, joined Tara following the

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    The D-G of MI5 who ordered the murder of Patrick Finucane has died.

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    By Joseph de Burca 1. Getting away with murder. Sir Patrick Walker was in charge of MI5 when the Belfast solicitor Patrick Finucane was assassinated by MI5 agents. Those agents were handled by the RUC Special Branch on behalf of MI5. They included Tommy Lyttle, Brian Nelson, William Stobie and Ken Barret. The assassination, which was bloody and brutal, was carried out in front of Finucane’s wife and young family. The assassination, which was bloody and brutal, was carried out in front of Finucane’s wife and young family. The Canadian judge who investigated the matter, Peter Cory, told the widow of Patrick Finucane that he had seen documents which emanated from ‘Cabinet’ level about the killing. The most reasonable interpretation of this is that Walker was ordered, or had the sanction of Margaret Thatcher and some of those around her in Whitehall, to murder Finucane. The British State has resisted an inquiry into the Finucane assassination for decades. It has flouted agreements and court orders in so doing. When David Cameron was in 10 Downing Street, he told the Finucane family that he could not order a public inquiry into the scandal. When Finucane’s brother Martin asked him why, he turned to Mrs. Finucane and said: “Look, the last administration couldn’t deliver an inquiry in your husband’s case and neither can we”. According to Cameron this was because “there are people all around this place, [10 Downing Street], who won’t let it happen”. As he was saying this, he raised a finger and made a circular motion in the air. Theresa May, who was Cameron’s Home Secretary between 2010 and 2016, did not order a proper inquiry either whem she became prime minister. Walker’s death will please those in Whitehall who are pulling the strings in the background in resistance to the establishment of a full judicial inquiry into the murder. They are engaged in a tactic of ‘running down the clock’. There are very few people alive now who were directly involved in the plot against Finucane. Village magazine accused Walker of the murder years ago. He was named in one story which has been read more than 22,000 times. He did not sue. He did even seek a right of reply. His silence now condemns him. A full account of the Finucane assassination can be found here, especially at Part 4: Thatcher’s Murder Machine, the British State assassination of Patrick Finucane. By Joseph de Burca. 2. Northern Ireland, counter-terrorism and ‘Death on the Rock’. Walker garnered considerable experience in NI on his way up MI5’s blood soaked greasy pole. He served as assistant to David Ransen, the head of MI5 in NI during the late 1970s. He rose to become the head of MI5’s counter-terrorism division (F Branch), 1984-86. He became Deputy D-G in 1986. He was a bully given to flashes of temper when things went wrong. He was the D-G who oversaw the killing of three members of an IRA active service unit (ASU) in Gibraltar in 1988. That unit was planning the slaughter of a harmless ceremonial band and guard. Suffice it to say, many non-military bystanders and tourists would have been wiped out too. How the IRA planned to equate such a massacre with a ‘just war’ is anyone’s guess. The elimination of the ASU became notorious because the IRA volunteers were on a scouting mission and were unarmed. The SAS men who shot them were acting in tandem with MI5. Carmen Proetta, who witnessed the SAS soldiers in action spoke to the media. Her account contra dicted that of the British government. She was then portrayed in the UK press as a prostitute. No money for guessing who briefed the hacks with that lie. She was later awarded libel damages. One female witness who saw the SAS soldiers in action spoke to the media. Her account contradicted that of the British government. She was then portrayed in the UK press as a prostitute. No money for guessing who briefed the hacks with that lie. She was later awarded libel damages. 3. Protecting paedophile rings. Walker was also in charge of MI5 during the last real heave by British MPs and journalists (such as Paul Foot) to uncover the truth about the vile Kincora Boys’ Home sex abuse scandal. MI5 and MI6 used the home as a ‘honey trap’ to collect ‘compromat’ about Loyalist terrorists and politicians. As a result of the cover-up, the wider paedophile ring of which Kincora was a part survived intact. Kincora was part of the Anglo-Irish Vice Ring which overlapped with a multitude of other similar rings.  An incalculable number of children were raped as a result of Walker’s contribution to the cover-up. An incalculable number of children were raped as a result of Walker’s contribution to the cover-up. Walker undoubtedly knew all about Kincora from his earlier days working in NI as assistant to David Ransen. Furthermore, the FX section of MI5 was responsible for surveillance operations which included telephone tapping, photographing and video taping of MI5 ‘compromat’  targets. At least one Kincora boy was raped by a senior DUP figure on the first floor of the Park Avenue Hotel in Belfast in 1976. He was one of many recorded by MI5 at the venue. While this event took place before Walker took over FX, he would have read all the files and may even have reviewed photographs and videos in the possession of FX as the Kincora scandal became a massive headache for MI5 during the 1980s. By then the DUP figure was in a senior political  position from where he was able to assist the cover-up. This man was an associate of the terrorist, serial killer and paedophile John McKeague. 4. Sailing by the same dark compass as his mentor. Walker was placed in charge of MI5 at the behest of his predecessor, Sir Anton Duff. Duff was another of those who covered up for paedophiles and state assassins. Unfortunately, Walker sailed by the same

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    Licence to Lie. Freddie Scappaticci, a British agent inside the IRA, sought immunity from prosecution from British legal authorities so he could claim he was not Agent Stakeknife at a secret meeting with a tribunal in Dublin.

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    By Deirdre Younge.   Introduction. Freddie Scappaticci became an agent for British Army intelligence in 1978. A member of the IRA in Belfast he worked his way up the IRA hierarchy,  eventually becoming  second in command of the ‘Internal Security Unit”,  known as the feared “nutting squad”. He joined the British Army’s newly-formed Force Research Unit in 1982.  Scappaticci has consistently claimed he is not an agent called ‘Stakeknife’ or ‘Steaknife’ including in his dealings with the Smithwick Tribunal in Dublin. The latter was established to investigate allegations of Garda collusion in the murders of Chief Superintendent Harry Breen and Superintendent Bob Buchanan in South Armagh, after they had left a meeting in Dundalk Garda Station in March 1989. Operation Kenova investigating the agent believed to be Scappaticci has  submitted files to the Public Prosecution Service in relation to perjury charges. Scappaticci had an extensive engagement with the Smithwick Tribunal set up in 2005 which reported in 2013. Though he did not give sworn evidence his legal team argued on his behalf that he was not an agent called ‘’Steaknife’ or ‘Stakeknife’. Through letters obtained through Freedom of information requests to the Lord Advocate of Scotland and the Attorney General of England and Wales it is clear that Scappaticci obtained protection from prosecution or immunity in relation to his interactions with Smithwick from the Lord Advocate of Scotland. He did not not receive a similar immunity or amnesty from the Attorney General of the UK despite Smithwick’s assertions that witnesses from the UK and Northern Ireland had received such protection.Documents obtained through Freedom of Information requests to the (Irish) Department of Justice show Scappaticci was paid his full legal costs of 382,270 euro in 2015. The bills were paid by the Department of Justice, signed off by the Department of Public Expenditure. The Letter from the British Attorney General.   The absence of such an amnesty has enormous implications in light of perjury allegations against Scappaticci in relation to his continual denials that he is an agent called ‘Steaknife’ or ‘Stakeknife’. It also calls into question the decision by the Smithwick Tribunal, set up in 2005 by Dail Eireann, not to reveal details of covert meetings with him and the decision by the Irish State to pay Scappaticci  nearly 400,000 in legal costs, primarily to claim he was not a British Military Intelligence and MI5  Agent called Steaknife or Stakeknife. Senior legal sources assert that Scappaticci spent three days in Dublin talking to the Tribunal. Documents released by the Department of Justice under FOI in relation to substantial legal costs paid to him in 2015, indicate extensive interactions between Scappaticci and the Tribunal. Smithwick on amnesty In the opening chapters of his 2013 report Judge Peter Smithwick has a chapter on amnesty for witnesses and the legal cover afforded by the Irish Tribunals of Evidence Act as follows: Any witness before the Tribunal would have protection in this jurisdiction from criminal prosecution on the basis of evidence given before it. The protection is enshrined in section 5 of the Tribunals of Inquiry (Evidence) Act 1979 which provides as follows: A statement or admission made by a person before a Tribunal or when being examined in pursuance of a commission or request issued under subsection (1) of section 1 of the Principal Act shall not be admissible as evidence against that person in any criminal proceedings (other than proceedings in relation to an offence under subsection (2) ( c ) (as inserted by this Act) of that section) – ( and that is a reference to the offence of providing false testimony to the Tribunal) and subsection (3) of that section shall be construed and have effect accordingly. The Judge went on to explain how witnesses from outside the jurisdiction could be provided with legal cover, particularly those from Northern Ireland and the UK – “However, given the cross-border aspects of the Inquiry, it was equally important to securing the attendance of witnesses that such protection be extended to the United Kingdom. The Tribunal therefore sought and received an undertaking from the then Attorney General of England and Wales, the Right Hon.,The Baroness Scotland Q.C., to similar effect. Subsequent to the devolution of policing and Justice powers to Northern Ireland on the 12th April 2010, Sir Alistair Frasier, the Director of Public Prosecutions for Northern Ireland confirmed that he would continue to honour Baroness Scotland’s undertaking. After the change of Government in the United Kingdom…the new Attorney General of England and Wales..Dominic Grieve Q.C M.P provided the Tribunal with confirmation that Baroness Scotland’s undertaking would continue to apply. The Tribunal subsequently, at the request of Freddie Scappaticci, sought and received a similar undertaking from the Lord Advocate, in relation to Scotland. This was given in terms specific to Mr Scappaticci..”(Page 9, the final Smithwick report, 2013). Judge Smithwick went on to to refer specifically to Scappaticci in the one and only reference to him in the Tribunal report, as follows : The Tribunal subsequently, at the request of Freddie Scappaticci, sought and received a similar undertaking in relation to Scotland. This was given in terms specific to Mr Scappaticci..   The Lord Advocate of Scotland in his role as Crown Prosecutor gave Freddie Scappaticci an amnesty to cover his interactions with the Smithwick Tribunal so that he could provide “a full account” to the Tribunal in 2012. The AG of England and Wales it is now apparent gave no such amnesty to Scappaticci. Other witnesses from the UK and Northern Ireland included Scappaticci’s former FRU, British Army Intelligence handler, retired Major David Moyles, other British army officers, as well as ex RUC and PSNI officers. Witnesses also included representatives of the IRA ASU who talked to the Tribunal from 2008 onwards. First representation Scappaticci’s solicitor first made an application for legal representation in 2006 but this was refused However his legal representative, Belfast solicitor Michael Flanagan submitted his first bill in relation to meetings in 2007. Like all Scappaticci’s covert

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    The Libyan weapons trail: How Gaddafi armed the IRA.

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    By Deirdre Younge Kingsberry case The High Court in Belfast granted permission in early July for the family of a former member of the UDA, William Kingsberry – shot dead in 1991, to sue Libya for supplying the assault rifle used by the IRA unit that killed him.  New approach The Kingsberry case, which is civil not criminal, is a new approach to gaining compensation for those killed or injured by Libyan-supplied matériel – and will be the first of many. The PSNI initially refused to confirm that Libyan-supplied Semtex was used in explosions after 1986; but a case brought by Belfast solicitors  KRWLaw in Belfast on behalf of a number of victims has established the link to the AKM rifle used in the 1991  Kingsberry case. The  Kingsberry case creates a precedent for many other victims.  Many were killed or injured in bombs made with the powerful Czechoslovakian-manufactured but Libyan-supplied semtex explosive which was used in massive bomb and mortar attacks. The massive increase in lethal bombings  fuelled with  semtex created hundreds of victims killed  or maimed after 1986.  The first so-called ‘spectacular’ was the explosion at the Remembrance Day service in Enniskillen in November 1987 which left eleven dead and others with horrific injuries, causing shock and revulsion. According to Irish Government documents Gerry Adams believed it was an IRA own goal. It also came at a time when Adams was building up Sinn Féin, the  political wing of the movement,  and there were tentative moves towards talks. RUC woman Colleen McMurray was murdered in 1991 when a mortar boosted by semtex was fired at the police car in which she was travelling in Newry. The 1996 Docklands bombings in London were ignited by semtex.  It was also used by so called ‘Dissidents’ to make the Banbridge bomb and the devastating Omagh bomb in 1998. Victims of all these atrocities are pushing for recognition and compensation. British Government reluctance So far, the British Government has refused to directly compensate victims of IRA Libyan-supplied weapons and semtex explosives out of the former overthrown leader General Muammaur Gaddafi’s funds, long frozen in British banks.  It also refuses to publish a report it commissioned on the issue of compensation, from ex-journalist and member of the Charity Commission, William Shawcross. Action in Northern Ireland  Actions in Northern Ireland are aimed at the British-Government-controlled funds in the UK.  In 2011 Solicitor Jason McCue, who represents victims of the  post-ceasefire Docklands bombings of 1996 and who acted for the Omagh Bomb relatives in their compensation case, obtained a letter from the Transitional  Libyan Government. It’s not clear what weight the letter carries.  The issue of compensating victims of the conflict in Northern Ireland has been mired in an argument about definitions. In the case of Libya it’s also entangled with the long and murky history of the various intelligence services’ involvement in Libya and the fractured politics post-Gaddafi.  Libya  Whether the post-Gaddafi state, weak and divided, should be expected to pay reparations may be moot but that is by no means the case with the interest now accruing to the British Government from Gaddafi funds in UK banks which could, in practice, be used to compensate victims. Sovereign Wealth Fund The new Libyan Prime Minister, Abdelhamid Dabaiba, has reportedly reached a deal with the Chairman of the country’s Sovereign Wealth Fund – the Libyan Investment Authority (LIA) – Ali Mahmoud Hassan, whereby Dabaiba will receive €1 billion  via the Central Bank of Libya for his cash-strapped Government. The deal shows the central importance in general terms of the Libyan fund and that the key is its control by Hassan, a former Gaddafi ally. Bahraini bank According to the French-based Africa Intelligence  the LIA  is sourcing the funds from CBL’s Bahraini subsidiary, ABC Bank. Most of the LIA’s assets abroad, amounting to billions of dollars, have been frozen since sanctions were imposed on Gaddafi.  Gaddafi investments in UK and Ireland Gaddafi invested in everything from Pearson Inc to RBS to office blocks to villages he liked when he went on sovereign visits. It has been alleged there is €1.5billion in Irish banks. There is around £11 billion in frozen Gaddafi-era funds in banks in the UK from which the British Government receives substantial interest payments.  It is from these assets in British Banks that lawyers will try to source the money for a compensation  fund.  The Libyan Government itself has been without a budget since  March. Caught up in the internal politics of Libya and competing loyalties of politicians, some loyal to General Haftar the former Gaddafi-era exile and ‘warlord’ are making their support conditional on appointment of Haftar allies from the east of the country, to strategic positions.  The Sovereign Fund is at the centre of allegations of the embezzlement of billions of dollars during the Gaddafi era. The Prime Minister himself has taken control of the Libyan Asset Recovery and Management Office  [LARMO] in an effort to keep control of investigations into corruption in various state organisations. [Africa Intelligence,  02/07/2021]  Hassan was in control of some of the organisations in question during the Gaddafi era and he is also the focus of scrutiny by the international community including the US State Department, for the lack of transparency in management of the Libyan Wealth Fund. It’s in this tangled atmosphere of competing interests and loyalties that the issue of compensation plays out. After Gaddafi The disastrous lack of preparation for the aftermath of the fall of the Gaddafi regime, by the UK and France in particular, left Libya divided in four between a powerless internationally recognised Government of National Accord; General Haftar – a returned exile from the US, who has shifting and tenuous  control of the valuable oil fields; the so called Tobruk administration; and various militias both Islamic and other. Al Qaeda has a presence in the desert regions.  Despite promises made by the Government of National Accord, the administration in Tripoli, it is questionable if the present Government  could implement

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    A murky affair: the Garda made no progress into the IRA murder of Tom Oliver until an intervention by Drew Harris, then with the PSNI, now Garda Commissioner.

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      By Deirdre Younge. Tom Oliver, a farmer from Riverstown, on the Cooley peninsula, was kidnapped, interrogated and murdered by the IRA in July 1991. They alleged he was a Garda informant. The murder by the IRA’s punishment squad didn’t only cause devastation for his family but split the tight-knit community in which he lived. IRA men living in the area were ostracised and barred from local pubs and GAA clubs  while gardaí were told to stay away from the area. The Garda were attacked for their failure to protect Mr Oliver who had given information to them about IRA weapons found on his land. Local IRA men were believed to have been strongly opposed to the murder of the popular family man but were reportedly overruled by Belfast leaders.   Oliver was abducted by a group which included FRU/ MI5 agent Kevin Fulton aka Peter Keeley and there are allegations that Freddie Scappaticci was among those who carried out the interrogations though he has denied it. Keeley gave a vivid description of the night Oliver was snatched and named some of those allegedly  involved, at the Smithwick Tribunal in December 2011.   Drew Harris the present Garda Commissioner, then PSNI Head of Legacy, arrived at the Smithwick Tribunal in October 2012 with “new and of the moment” intelligence that a garda who had not been identified to the Smithwick Tribunal after years of private and public investigations was the ‘colluder’ who had betrayed Oliver to the IRA. Operation Kenova took up Oliver’s case and has discovered new DNA evidence. Oliver’s battered body was found a day later in Belleeks, Co Armagh. The Oliver case has been investigated and reinvestigated by the Garda in Dundalk. The latest reinvestigation just completed has found multiple flaws in the handling of the case.   Operation Kenova under Jon Boutcher took the Oliver case as part of its remit. It has now apparently found new evidence after DNA analysis was done on clothing, which appears to advance the case.  The Tom Oliver case became a central issue in the Smithwick Tribunal in Dublin which reported in 2013. FRU (British military intelligence), Special Branch and MI5 agent and informer Kevin Fulton whose real name is Peter Keeley described what he called the “abduction” of Tom Oliver, in his evidence. He gave a vivid description of the night of the abduction and of how Oliver was carried in the boot of a car to his interrogators. The cross-examining barrister, Jim O’Callaghan, acting for Garda Owen Corrigan, said of the evidence   – “you are describing the last moments of a man’s life”.  Keeley was the driver for the IRA’s  ‘Nutting Squad’ on the night Tom Oliver was kidnapped and took him to his final destination. Keeley as Fulton also implicated Fred Scappaticci in Tom Oliver’s interrogation at Smithwick. Scappaticci got legal representation to deny both that he was  involved in Oliver’s murder and that he was Agent Stakeknife! See also: Investigation: Killusion The present Garda Commissioner Drew Harris, as Head of Legacy in the PSNI, had a crucial role at Smithwick as the gatekeeper for intelligence and information from the various UK Security Services. He made a last- minute dramatic intervention  to present intelligence  emanating from M15, of the involvement of a garda who had not been identified to the Tribunal, in setting up Oliver for murder. No name has so far emerged. Drew Harris also named the senior IRA figure he claimed had ordered that Tom Oliver be shot.  See also: How Drew Harris diverted the Smithwick Tribunal. Operation Kenova and Chief Superintendent Jon Boutcher are interviewing former Gardai and others who may have evidence or intelligence about Tom Oliver’s abduction and murder. Mr Oliver was taken from near his home in Castlecarra Cooley late on the evening of the 18th July while tending cattle. His interrogation, carried out by the Internal Security Squad, was finally ‘adjudicated’ on by a senior member of the Army Council who arrived at a ‘safe house’ in Cooley after breaking off a holiday. He is believed to have overruled the local IRA officer commanding and decided that Tom  Oliver must be shot. He was then transported into South Armagh where his battered body was found the next day.  Will Operation Kenova and Jon Boutcher  finally achieve justice for Tom Oliver and his family?   OTHER STORIES ABOUT GARDA-RUC-PSNI AFFAIRS ON THIS WEBSITE BY DEIRDRE YOUNGE: How Drew Harris diverted the Smithwick Tribunal. Nailing Harry Breen Investigation: Killusion Drew Harris Drawn in. SMITHWICK’s SECRET WITNESS MI5 FLIES A FALSE FLAG. New DUP leader Jeffrey Donaldson alleged that a Garda mole was involved in the IRA murder of two RUC officers.    

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    Investigation: Killusion

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    The Smithwick Tribunal was set up in 2005, by the Irish Government on the advice of Michael McDowell, then Minister for Justice, and sat in public in Blackhall Place from 2011 until 2013, examining the possibility of Garda collusion in the deaths of Chief Superintendent Harry Breen and Superintendent Bob Buchanan, of the Royal Ulster Constabulary (RUC) who were murdered North of the Border in March 1989, after a brief meeting in Dundalk Garda Station. The purpose of the RUC officers’ visit was to discuss a move against the IRA’s Tom ‘Slab’ Murphy, which had been ordered by then Northern Ireland Secretary of State, Tom King. The Smithwick Tribunal ended up in 2011 with a strange, abstract, finding of ‘collusion’ in the murders of the two RUC men. Though it found “no smoking gun” in Dundalk, the Tribunal weakly decided there was indeed less specific evidence of “collusion by gardaí” in the murders. Dutifully, Enda Kenny described these findings as “shocking” and a public and media jaded in affairs Northern determined rather vaguely to remember that Smithwick was about a search for evidence of collusion which it had somehow found. What is extraordinary is that Smithwick provided no name for the ‘colluder’, though it clearly for a long time thought it was Owen Corrigan – even though it wasn’t. One of the reasons for this is that there may in fact have been no Garda colluder, a big embarrassment for those who felt a tribunal needed to be instigated and, worse, for those who conducted the inquiry without ever drawing attention to the inaccuracy of the premise that led to it but who saved face by continuingly, through the eight years of its existence, pretending there was one, albeit with less and less specificity. Smithwick was swayed into its collusion abstraction by the PSNI (which succeeded the RUC) giving untestable, very-late evidence to the Tribunal privately naming a fourth garda who was more plausible than Owen Corrigan as the colluder. Fulton: the man whose evidence led to a falsely perceived need for the Tribunal Smithwick always focused on Corrigan as the colluder because the Cory Inquiry, which prompted the Smithwick Tribunal, unduly relied on the 2003 evidence of a dissembling double agent known as ‘Kevin Fulton’ – now challenged by a source who spoke to Village – that Corrigan gave deadly information to the IRA about the RUC men. In its report the Smithwick Tribunal stated [at 15.1.2]: “This statement was a key factor in Judge Cory’s decision to recommend the establishment of this Tribunal, and Kevin Fulton was therefore an important witness before this Tribunal”. In any event Fulton actually seems to have later changed his story (when giving evidence to Smithwick in 2011) to say that Corrigan gave information to the IRA only about a 37-year-old Cooley farmer, informant Tom Oliver, who An Phoblacht then accused of passing on information to Garda Special Branch. Oliver was kidnapped, allegedly interrogated by Scappaticci and subsequently murdered. The changed story was that Corrigan gave information about Oliver, not about the doomed RUC men; but even the changed story was expressly and ignominiously disavowed by Smithwick, under pressure in a recent High Court case, to the extent it implied that Corrigan’s information led to Oliver’s death. In other words everything related to Fulton collapsed, despite Smithwick’s paean to him. Kevin Fulton had begun to engage with the Smithwick Tribunal in 2006. In its opening statement in 2011, the Tribunal made it clear that “Mr Fulton has elaborated on and expanded the statement he provided to Judge Cory”. The expanded statement was given to Corrigan’s lawyers in November 2011. For the first time they saw the central allegation made by Fulton which sensationally implicated Freddie Scappaticci, ‘Stakeknife’. It did not concern the murders of the two RUC Officers but instead implicated Sergeant Owen Corrigan in giving information which would lead to the death of an alleged IRA informer, Tom Oliver. The first reason not to believe Fulton is that a book about him makes no mention of any of this. Admittedly Fulton now distances himself from the graphic book called ‘Unsung Hero’ about his life but this is chiefly understandable as an expedient in the face of the, at least nine, PSNI Investigations arising from it, and the many civil actions in the pipeline. He has already had to pay compensation to the family of Eoin Morley, a Newry man shot dead in 1990, after failing even to enter an appearance in the Belfast High Court to proceedings by his mother. Nevertheless it is undeniably notable that at no stage in the book does Fulton mention a garda in Dundalk station passing information to the IRA, though it was scarcely something he’d be expected to omit. Nor is there any other evidence – of any sort – that he passed information about Corrigan or other Dundalk gardaí, to his handlers. Bizarrely Smithwick warmly endorsed Fulton, a man who had made a lifetime “career” of deception, as a highly credible witness, in his final report, even in effect if he completely and absolutely disavowed him in the subsequent legal action. Surprisingly, Smithwick was to say of Fulton: “He sat only metres from me and I observed him throughout. He was a very impressive and credible witness and I have formed the view that his evidence was truthful”. However, clearly there is a shadow over the statement from Fulton which inspired Cory’s call for what became the Smithwick Tribunal. If this is so it rewrites the history of both inquiries. Fulton’s’ similar role in other high-profile investigations will emerge in the coming months. But what exactly was the core allegations that convinced Cory and then hung Smithwick out to dry? This is the Fulton Statement as published originally in the Cory Report in 2003: “In 1979 I enlisted in the British Army. Within months of my posting, I was recruited by a British Intelligence Agency to act as an agent. In this capacity, I

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