Morrison conviction quashed

As expected, Danny Morrison’s conviction is quashed, with perhaps more to come..

Lord Chief Justice Kerr
“There is nothing in the papers which intrinsically militates against the delivery of an open judgment detailing the reasons for our decision,” he said. “We will, however, give the parties the opportunity, if they wish to avail of it, to seek to persuade the Court not to deliver what I might describe as an open judgment.”
Always remembered as the coiner of the “armalite and ballot paper” slogan for the political strategy and easily the most personable of the emerging republican leadership in the 80s I often wonder if the ceasefire timetable might not have moved faster if Morrison had been around and not then marginalised on his release. He seemed to have real influence with Gerry Adams during the hunger strike, which was when I first got wind of an embryonic political strategy. Although he wrote a play in which IRA and Castlereagh interrogation methods were compared, ( the IRA came off worse), he always seemed to me to be an unlikely head of a kangaroo court. Not that I would really know of course.

Brian Walker

Former BBC journalist and manager in Belfast, Manchester and London, Editor Spolight; Political Editor BBC NI; Current Affairs Commissioning editor BBC Radio 4; Editor Political and Parliamentary Programmes, BBC Westminster; former London Editor Belfast Telegraph. Hon Senior Research Fellow, The Constitution Unit, Univ Coll. London