Davison acquitted of McCartney murder
Mr Justice Gillen had told the court that he would provide a verdict “in the not too distant future.” The BBC report that he has found Terence Davison not guilty of the murder of Robert McCartney. No word yet on the other charges or the others charged.. nor on how the Provisional IRA investigation affected the trial. Update The Belfast Telegraph reports that all the accused were found not guilty on all charges.
The judge said he realised the McCartney family would be frustrated and disappointed at his verdict, but the dead man’s memory would be ill-served by the court failing to observe the highest standards of criminal justice and the burden of proof that prevails.
And from the updated BBC report
The judge warned the three acquitted men that they could yet be brought back to court if more evidence emerges. “I have no doubt that the investigation into this crime will continue and if new evidence emerges in connection with this murder no one, including for that matter even the accused in this trial, will be beyond the reach of potential prosecution,” he added.
More from the Irish Times report And This report.
Robert McCartney’s sister Catherine said the lack of justice lay firmly at the feet of Sinn Féin and the IRA. Speaking outside the court she said her brother’s murder was an embarrassment for the British and Irish governments. Ms McCartney said she believed that the PSNI have a wealth of information on the murder but cannot turn any of it into evidence as “fear still exists and as long as it still exists, we won’t get justice”.
Tell’us another,
Could you please make your way to your local PSNI station, with your eye-witness account. You could re-open this whole trial again.
I’m sure you will do your civic duty, and imprison these killers.
Then again, you might be telling porky pies!!!
TAF, it started out as morally bankrupt, and all you see now is what was always there. You are looking at people who were led to believe that civil rights were best advanced by a campaign of organised killing, when it is self-evident that those who have scant regard for human rights would have even less regard for civil rights. There wasn’t any strategy to unify Ireland by violence, since such a campaign would have meant a few hundred Mafioso defeating the British Army, followed by defeating the protestant population in a civil war, followed by defeating the Irish Army, and followed by defeating the Irish people in another civil war. In terms of being sure that your strategy was worth killing and dying for, that one sorta fails the acid test, eh?
Still, the people are loyal to their self-serving Mafioso, believing that they defended them from attacks rather than created the conditions that led to those attacks, deliberately attacking Protestants in order to engineer protestant retaliation against Catholics, thereby leading the Catholics to believe that they needed the Provos to defend them.
That ‘loyalty’ is still there too – protecting the Mafioso from the judicial consequences of their misdeeds at the bar in question and causing the people to spit on the McCartney sisters.
Dave.
Growing up as a unionist within the Unionist community my views used to be similar to your own.
The last few years with discolure after disclosure at the full extent of British involvement with the Loyalist campaigns have now brought me to the point where I can not honestly say one side is in any way better than the other.
We only get to hold the moral high ground when we refrain from acting like those we castigate.
“Still, the people are loyal to their self-serving Mafioso, believing that they defended them from attacks rather than created the conditions that led to those attacks, deliberately attacking Protestants in order to engineer protestant retaliation against Catholics, thereby leading the Catholics to believe that they needed the Provos to defend them”
Right, I get it now, the 874 cilillians that loyalists killed was all the fault of Republicans ?
Do piss off you fucking troll
Tell us another, judging by the very specific information that you have provided you were obiously in the bar that night and saw all events unfolding?
I hope that you’ve given a fully comprehensive statement of the ‘facts’ in your posession To the PSNI.
Paddy Kielty wrote
“Have you brought this ground breaking evidence to the PSNI?
No…..I doubt it!”
What a bloody stupid thing to write, it would be quite impossible to make yourself look even more stupid than you did with that childish post.
1) The Police found no blood inside the bar it was cleaned up by members of the IRA and republicans who do election for S/F or who have active parts in local protests for S/F (ormeau rd orange marchs for example)
2) Devine had his throat slashed inside the bar with a broken bottle, this has been part of the “court evidence” it has been corroborated by 2 other people who were inside the bar but were not on the witness list as it has not been disputed even by defense
3) the man who had his hand gashed had it done by one of Mr McCartneys murderers who was trying to slash Mr Devines throat at the time, the P.S.N.I already knew this from several sources and had it corroborated by “witness D”.
Why don’t you go and ask the man who had his hand gashed why he didn’t have the perpetrator charged with ABH or GBH.
4) The PSNI had a lot of other evidence that was not brought before the court in trial because intimidation by the localised IRA went unabated for years.
Why do you not question why Witness ‘D’ withdrew their evidence
why Witness ‘A’ withdrew their evidence
why Witness ‘B’ withdrew their evidence
Better still Paddy Kielty instead of mouthing off about a subject you nothing about why didn’t you sit everyday in court like the rest of us then you would have been properly informed instead of singing from a S/F hymm sheet.
why don’t you go and get the court papers and read them for yourself
‘Still, the people are loyal to their self-serving Mafioso, believing that they defended them from attacks rather than created the conditions that led to those attacks, deliberately attacking Protestants in order to engineer protestant retaliation against Catholics, thereby leading the Catholics to believe that they needed the Provos to defend them.’
Dave thanks for illustrating your complete lack of knowledge from the past few decades. laughable.
>>Do piss off you fucking troll<<
Actually at one time he had polar opposite views to those he now bores us with. He now lurks in the same company as extreme fantasist Loyalist/Unionists. Even moderate Unionists do not parrot the discredited nonsense that is now his usual sermon.
Yep the troll label sits well there.
Now little children I want you all to sit up and pay attention!!!!
It seems that some of you are having problems with the murder of Robert McCartney, well when I say some of you I really mean P.Kielty UFB and Pat McLarnon (Dec) there are others but I really couldn’t be arsed even typing their names as any more than three Shinner plonkers named in one post is far too disturbing to contemplate.
So what I’m going to do is to Revise the story in words you Shinner lovers out there and I know there are a few will understand and you’ll be able to get your very tiny heads around.
*********************************************8
Once upon a time
There was a group of Catholics out having a drink and watching a match on T.V in a pub in the City centre.
The craic was mighty as the group had a laugh at each other and the performances of some of the players’ one of the Catholics even made a rude jester at the TV screen as one of the players was particularly bad.
What the Catholics didn’t know was the Bar was full of Protestants back from a band parade and some of them were hardened Loyalist killers.
The Loyalists swung into action saying that the Panasonic TV was a friend of theirs and that the Catholics had insulted it, the Catholics apologised saying they were sorry but no offence was meant.
It wasn’t good enough the Loyalists grabbed chairs and ashtrays flinging them with full-force at the Catholics, the dirty Loyalists broke bottles to use as offensive weapons against the Catholics trying to cut their throats at every opportunity inside a packed bar, the rest of the protestants just stood watching as the attempted butchery took place in the packed City centre bar.
The Catholic victims fled the bar to get to safety but the mad butchering Loyalist chased after the fleeing victims to make sure these Taig bastards didn’t breathe again.
Armed with cudgels broken bottles and knives taken from the kitchen of the bar this murderous scum descended on the beaten and bloodied Catholics who were now surrounded in an alleyway, it was here the Catholics were repeatedly beaten and stabbed and eventually left to die in the road where sadly one of them did.
The police came but the Loyalist had cleaned the bar from top to bottom and even scrubbed and bleached the incriminating blood stains from the ground outside the bar.
The family of the dead Catholic asked the Orange Order who organised the bad parade to help identify the Loyalist butchers, the Orange Order claimed it was nothing to do with them and that none of their members were involved and that people should help the PSNI but at the same time brief the media that it was a nothing but a drunken pub brawl.
The Catholic family then find out that a marshal in the Orange Order was in the bar at the time and witnessed the attack but didn’t come forward
That 70 bandsmen all claimed to be in the toilet at the same time when the Catholics were being attacked.
That 70 bandsmen were still in the toilet some 20mins later when evidence in the bar was being destroyed by the hardened Loyalist killers.
That the bar workers on duty didn’t see couldn’t remember or didn’t hear anything because they were all changing the same keg out the back for 30minutes.
That the UVF murder gang had at least 20 interviews some lasting for 5 hours with most of the witnesses before the trial started.
That of all the Christians that were in, outside, or near the bar that night the only person who came forward was a Muslim woman.
** NOW WOULD THESE POSTERS BE HAPPY WITH THAT **
That was rather shite, The Devil. To be honest, it just didn’t work on any level.Now why don’t you go for a wee lie down?
“I really mean P.Kielty UFB and Pat McLarnon (Dec) there are others but I really couldn’t be arsed even typing their names as any more than three Shinner plonkers named in one post is far too disturbing to contemplate”
Just right too Devil – anyone that voices a differing opinion that dosen’t fit in with your politically motivated idea of what happened that night is obviously a “Shinner Plonker”.
Never seen unionism trying to use that dehumanising trick before. Christ, you really are a gabshite
Btw, neat little bit of sectarianism introduced there on your re-telling of the story however when you started the story with
“There was a group of Catholics out having a drink and watching a match on T.V in a pub”
And then mentioned loyalists I thought that it was certain that the story was going to finish with the bar being “sprayed”.
Well the saying must be true about the devil making work for idle hands because that analogy comparison was something rhyming with rank.
I seem to remember that several Sinn Fein members were in the bar. When questioned, they all claimed to have been at the toilet and said they saw nothing. God knows what testimony they subsequently gave to the police, but I think it’s safe to say that they know who was involved in the infraction with McCartney and they didn’t come forward as eyewitnesses in the trial. The killers were obviously quite concerned that footage of what took place in the bar could convict them, since they removed it from the bar’s CCTV recorders. The killers were in the bar, there were people who knew who they were, and they did not come forward. Would anyone like to guess why ?
In the subsequent council elections, Sinn Fein lost a seat in the Pottinger, ie their votes from the Short Strand; a seat was gained by Alliance. You can read into that what you like, but I’m pretty sure that people in the Short Strand were expressing their distaste for Sinn Fein and the subsequent treatment of the McCartneys.
I see people in the thread, obviously Sinn Fein members, saying “well, take your evidence to the police!”. That has been Sinn Fein’s line all along, and they believe that asking people in public to go to the police gets them off the hook. There’s no way that people are going to go to the police and say anything that would have produced any significant evidence against McCartney’s IRA killers.
On the subject of Diplock courts, if I were the defence lawyer and if I had the right to do so, I’d have requested a Diplock trial. Diplock courts have a lower conviction rate; judges are less likely to convict due to the absence of a jury, and given the eyewitness testimony here and the high profile of the case, finding a jury that would have delivered a not-guilty verdict would have been reasonably difficult.
Tell’ us another,
my name is paul not paddy! Or is that your anti-Irish racist mask slipping again?
Firstly, I am not a member of Sinn Fein!
Secondly, so you “sat in court everyday like the rest of us…”; did you? So what is your occupation then?
You choose to ignore the facts of the case that were presented before the courts. So when the verdict went against your narrow minded viewpoint, you lashed out in the only manner you know.
You really need to let go of your hatred. It consumes you.
MICK HALL
Thus my point about the Diplock court not being the appropriate place to try these men in stands. That the State failed to present evidence of the accused links with paramilitaries was highly relevant here?
Huge risk of juror intimidation if this trial had not been a Diplock trial. We’re dealing with some real nasties in this case.
Lord Diplock is hardly an example of truth and honesty as far as I am concerned as his courts were simply a conveyor belt system to lock up Irish republicans.
They convicted some Irish “republicans” who committed serious crimes. They also acquitted many Irish “republicans” and convicted many more “loyalists”.
The Diplock courts were set up as I have already said because the British state could no longer trust an Irish jury to convict republicans by a majority verdict.
So you say. Everyone else understands that they were set up because of actual juror intimidation and the high risk of juror intimidation in terrorist trials.
If it was simply about protecting witnesses as you claim, what difference would a Diplock court make? as the very same witnesses who would have appeared in a jury trial, went on to testify before Diplock courts and those courts had no difficulty in getting witnesses to testify, nor to convict. The only difference being they only had to convince a subjective judge, not 12 good people and true as British law until then demanded.
Er, the issue was to do with the juries, not witnesses (Diplock trials are no-jury trials!).
McGRATH
The debate about a sympathetic jury or an intimidated jury really has no bearing, as a safe jury could be selected in any other region of the UK outside of NI (for NI cases). This in large part supports the argument that the Diplock systems is no more than a rubber stamp version of Internment.
Strange comment. A juror in England could be intimidated too.
Despite this site’s usual palaver about the trial, the accused were declared not guilty by a Diplock judge of all the charges – what I declared would happen right after the killing, given the reliability of Devine, the cause of the affray, the role of the Davisons, Sinn Fein, and the PIRA, etc.
And there will not be another trial of them unless the killer, who many seem to know, is identified, and forced to defend his apparent innocence in court.
So why not state who he is, and let the chips fall where they may? Or is this just more palaver too?
paul kielty,
anti-irish racist mask slipping again??????
Tell me does your wee mammy know your on her computer again?
You made several very stupid unfounded statements about a subject you know next to fuck all about!
These same statements run rife through the mindset of the sinn fein mouth pieces that fermented as many lies and half truths to confuse and muddle as many people as posible.
So you’re either a Sinn Fein mouth piece or an uneducated fool who’s very easily fooled! you tell us.
EVEN WHEN YOU REMINDED OF THE CASE FACTS WHICH DISCREDITED YOUR POST AND PROVED THAT IT WAS NOT THE DECEASED OR HIS COMPANIONS THAT SPILLED THE BLOOD OF ANY OF THE ACCUSED YOU BLINDLY IGNORED IT AND INSTEAD ACCUSE ME OF BEING RACIST.
Get permission from your Mammys to use her computer more often who knows in twenty or thirty years you may even post somthing that contains a thought of your own.
willowfield
Mick F made a point that the British state claimed it set up the diplock courts due to intimidation of witnesses, like you it seems I challenged this believing they were set up, amongst other reasons due to alleged jury tampering.
Personally I believe these men were tried in a diplock because the State wanted this matter put to bed without a conviction and this could not be guaranteed with a jury trial due to the anger around at the time about the way Mr McCartney had his life stolen.
[ people new who committed this crime due to the fact that two people can not keep a secret, let alone thirty plus people who have weak bladders.]
tell’us another(ONE!),
I do apologise! You are a thoroughly decent chap. Your whole approach to debate is sheer class.
I wonder if your ‘mammy’ taught you to conduct yourself in this manner.
In future, I would appreciate if you didn’t repond to my posts with sheer billergerence.
Grow up and learn some basic manners.
Why do the sister’s never mention Robert’s dear friend Brendan Devine who had his throat cut in the same incident?