Press Release
Following the publication in February of the Police Ombudsman's report into the RUC investigation of the McGurk's Massacre, the Chief Constable, Matt Baggott, rejected key aspects of the Ombudsman’s findings. He tried to suggest that the hurt caused to the families was as a result of ‘confusion’ and was not the direct result of a deliberate campaign of disinformation involving the RUC, British Army HQ and the NIO.
We met the Chief Constable within days of his statement and asked him to study the report and meet all of the families to let us know exactly which of the 13 findings he rejected and why. We understood that this would take a matter of weeks. Three months later the Chief Constable is still refusing to meet us or give us any explanation for his deeply hurtful statement. He has had the ear of Special Branch but has remained deaf to the families of the victims.
The lie, the spin, the disinformation in relation to McGurk's Bar began with a report from the RUC Duty Officer on the morning after the bombing which claimed that a man with a suitcase had entered the bar and set the suitcase down to be picked up by another person. This is the RUC fabrication and pretext that the explosion was an IRA bomb-in-transit. This is the black propaganda that villified the good name of our families.
We have brought a suitcase here today for the Chief Constable. This symbolises the years of lies and deception. The suitcase that never was but which was invented by RUC officers. The IRA bomb that was in fact a UVF bomb.
That lie was followed by many others and this suitcase contains copies of the documents that spread the lies, the spin, the disinformation. Special Branch reports, British Army HQ intelligence summaries, John Taylor’s statement to Stormont, Prime Minister Faulkner’s briefing to Home Secretary Maudling and more (all available on our Research page).
The question has arisen of an apology from the Chief Constable on behalf of the police. We no longer wish to hear an apology. The time has past. After such a delay it would serve no purpose.
What we do want to hear from the Chief Constable is if he now accepts the report of the Police Ombudsman. No ifs or buts or excuses. And no more delays - for these delays have only exacerbated the trauma felt by our families.
We are no longer requesting a meeting with the Chief Constable. The onus is now on him as a public servant.
End Note: As always we thank our friends in the Pat Finucane Centre and the British Irish Rights Watch for their continuing support, never mind their time.
In response to the announcement of an investigation into the allegations made by Police Ombudsman CEO, Sam Pollock, against senior civil servants from the Department of Justice, a spokesperson for the Pat Finucane Centre said:
"In his letter of resignation Sam Pollock made TWO serious allegations. One concerned alleged interference by Department of Justice civil servants. This is now to be investigated, a step forward.
The second, and in our view more serious allegation, however, concerned "a significant lowering in the professional independence between the office of the Ombudsman and the PSNI".
Today's statement by Justice Minister David Ford does not address this second key area.
We share the concerns of other NGOs and families that the operational independence of the Police Ombudsman may have been compromised and this concern has yet to be dealt with.
Events surrounding the report into the bombing of McGurk's Bar and the extraordinary delays in a number of other reports have caused serious concerns in respect of the willingness of the Ombudsman to issue factual, evidence based findings concerning the actions of the Police."
This follows a press report which details the families' doubts about the independence and impartiality of the Police Ombudsman under the weight of the malign influence of present-day political policing.
Read the Irish News interview 16th April 2011
Ian Knox's Lampoon 16th April 2011
We, the families of the McGurk’s Bar bombing on 4th December 1971, wish to honour the memory of those who died and all the many others who were injured. They are always in our thoughts and prayers. They were innocent victims whose memory was besmirched for many years by the slur that they were bombers. We are relieved that today their memories are vindicated.
The Police Ombudsman has upheld complaints made against the RUC by the families. We broadly welcome those findings, particularly that there was investigative bias by the RUC, but disagree with his finding that there was no collusion.
Before going any further, we state that although the bombing took place nearly forty years ago, we all still live every day with the pain and loss inflicted on us. That pain was exacerbated by a deliberate lie, created in the aftermath of their horrific deaths, that our loved ones had been responsible for the explosion. The so-called IRA “own goal” theory added intolerable insult to our unbearable injury and grief.
The families had made complaints in four main areas. In three of these four areas their complaints have been upheld.
THE FIRST COMPLAINT CONCERNS THE RUC INVESTIGATION:
The Ombudsman’s damning verdict on the RUC is:
• That the investigation was “selective and consequently misleading”
• That “the police failed to investigate effectively the information received”
• That the police did not rigorously explore the possibility of Loyalist involvement and that this was “a serious failure”.
The Ombudsman’s report amounts to a damning indictment of the RUC investigation in the aftermath of the bombing. That investigation was based on a lie – against all the evidence - that republicans were behind the bombing. There was a complete failure by investigating officers, amounting to wilful incompetence, to carry out inquiries on the ground, such as door-to-door enquires.
The Ombudsman’s report can find no explanation why successive Chief Constables failed to put the record straight. It also damns the RUC investigation following the 1978 conviction of the only perpetrator so far brought to justice, UVF man Robert Campbell. The RUC then failed to arrest and question four other named UVF suspects, even when intelligence became available suggesting they had acted alongside Campbell.
Instead of the true perpetrators being brought before the courts, the tragedy at McGurk’s was used to justify the internment of two uninvolved republicans. Those who died and were injured along with their families deserve justice.
THE NEXT COMPLAINT CONCERNED BRIEFINGS TO THE UNIONIST GOVERNMENT
The then Stormont Prime Minister, Brian Faulkner, told the British Home Secretary Reginald Maudling at a meeting in London two days after the bombing that our loved ones died because an IRA bomb in transit had detonated prematurely. Even more hurtful is the revelation that Faulkner had asked the RUC to check the backgrounds of those who had been murdered – the presumption being that they had been involved in the bombing.
The following day, even as we were burying our dead, John Taylor, then Minister for Home Affairs (who has refused to meet with the Police Ombudsman) repeated the ‘own goal’ myth at Stormont. Taylor even had the audacity to advise our shocked and grieving community “to think twice before they accept the type of propaganda” that was “being fed to them”.
If he had any decency he would have apologized long ago.
The Police Ombudsman concludes that these deeply hurtful, baseless, biased and misleading briefings came directly from the RUC.
THE NEXT COMPLAINT CONCERNS INFORMATION IN THE PUBLIC DOMAIN
The “own goal” theory was widely reported in the media. Erroneous RUC and British Army internal briefing documents, including mythical accounts of wanted IRA men being in the bar, found their way into supposed quality British newspapers including “The Times” and “The Guardian”. As the Ombudsman concluded, ‘inaccurate briefings attributed to police officers and reported in the media contributed to the erosion of confidence of bereaved families and survivors in the investigation.’ There are lessons here for today’s media, both here in Ireland and abroad, about taking any official briefings at face value.
The RUC perversely attributed the McGurk’s Bar bombing to the IRA in the face of overwhelming evidence to the contrary:
• Eye witness evidence
• Forensic evidence the evidence of the pathologist
• The claim of responsibility from loyalists and denials from both wings of the IRA
We believe that all of the above, taken as a whole, amounts to evidence of collusive behaviour by the RUC. It amounted to corrupt practice and obstruction of justice. It is disappointing that the Ombudsman does not agree.
The UVF bomb on the night of December 4th 1971 was a horrific and lasting tragedy for all of us. We lost mothers, fathers, brothers, sons, daughters, grandfathers, grandmothers, good neighbours and friends. Those who were injured have also had to live with horrific consequences and the lies told about them. The lie that smeared the good names of the dead and injured immediately afterwards, and which was spread by the RUC, British Army and leading Stormont politicians, compounded that tragedy and exculpated the guilty.
This journey has been a painful one for all of us but a dark cloud has been lifted. Less than eight weeks after McGurk’s Bar, we watched in horror as fellow citizens were mown down on the streets of Derry on Bloody Sunday. There too the dead were blamed and a lie went around the world. An official lie. Our dead were forgotten in the torrent of events that then took place. Last year, on June 15th, we watched with joy and solidarity as the 14 Bloody Sunday dead were declared innocent and the families were vindicated before the eyes of the world.
This report conclusively and officially confirms:
James Francis Cromie (13 years old) - INNOCENT
Maria McGurk (14 years old) - INNOCENT
Edward Laurence Kane (29 years old) - INNOCENT
Robert Charles Spotswood (38 years old) - INNOCENT
Elizabeth Philomena McGurk (46 years old) - INNOCENT
Thomas Kane (48 years old) - INNOCENT
John Colton (49 years old) - INNOCENT
David Milligan (53 years old) - INNOCENT
Kathleen Irvine (53 years old) - INNOCENT
Thomas McLaughlin (55 years old) - INNOCENT
Sarah Keenan (58 years old) - INNOCENT
James Patrick Smyth (58 years old) - INNOCENT
Francis Bradley (63 years old) - INNOCENT
Edward Keenan (69 years old) – INNOCENT
Phillip Garry (73 years old) - INNOCENT
and all those who were injured –INNOCENT
Their only crime was their faith.
We are deeply disappointed and angered at the statement issued this afternoon by the Chief Constable of the PSNI, Matt Baggott, in the wake of today’s Ombudsman’s report on the McGurk’s Bar explosion in which fifteen innocent people lost their lives.
Mr. Baggott’s statement falls very far short of the apology which the families deserve and which the circumstances demand. It also fails to fulfil the Ombudsman’s recommendation that he make a statement “to acknowledge the enduring pain caused to the families by the actions of police following the atrocity”.
The chief constable says in his statement:
The Ombudsman’s report is the latest of a series of historical investigations into this outrage. Other reports have reached differing judgments regarding the initial RUC investigation. None of them have concluded that there was evidence of investigatory bias.
This is plainly incorrect on several fronts. There have been NO investigations that have cleared the police of investigatory bias. The current Historical Enquiries Team investigation is incomplete and awaits conclusion. It is, in any case, precluded from investigating police malpractice.
Further, the chief constable is simply wrong to blame media speculation for the lie that was published after the McGurk’s Bar bombing which held the victims responsible. Wrongful media reports were based on police and British military briefings, not speculation as the chief constable claims.
The chief constable’s statement speaks of “continued confusion” which, he says, he regrets. The “confusion” to which he refers originates from specific police briefings given to the press and leading politicians at the time of the bombing which led to the victims being blamed and their good names being besmirched.
The families will be hurt and re-traumatised by the chief constable’s statement. He has missed an opportunity to lift a shadow from their lives and set the record straight.
Statement released jointly by the Pat Finucane Center and the British Irish Rights Watch on behalf of our families.
On this, the 39th anniversary of the atrocity, a startling archive find has proved that the McGurk’s Bar Massacre cover-up involved none other than Brian Faulkner, Northern Ireland Prime Minister at the time. Not only is he recorded lying to the British Home Secretary that the bomb was an IRA own-goal but, in a glaring admission of political interference in a police investigation, Faulkner tells those present in Whitehall that he has directed the RUC “to find out whether anything was known about the associations of the people who were killed or injured”. The complete innocence or Human Rights of fifteen men, women and children who were butchered or the sixteen who survived meant nothing to him. All that mattered was the success of his deception and the consequent upholding of the discriminatory Interim Custody Orders (Internment without Trial) which he directed solely against Irish Roman Catholics.
On the 6th December 1971, Faulkner travelled to London to meet with the British Home Secretary, Reginald Maudling, for what would have been crunch talks on the security situation in the north of Ireland. Two days previously, fifteen men women and children had been massacred by loyalist terrorists in a no-warning bomb attack on bar run by the McGurk family. Faulkner could not allow blame to rest with loyalists, though.
When Internment was introduced in August 1971 the British authorities had urged Faulkner to include alleged Protestant extremists in the trawl so that it could be argued that the special orders were not designed to be directed solely against the Catholic community. Faulkner refused as he knew that he would not have the support of his party or the RUC. Instead, an “Arrest Policy for Protestants” was raised and meant that no loyalists were interned until 1973 even though they had killed well over a hundred people by then. Therefore, if it was admitted that loyalists had perpetrated mass murder on the 4th December 1971, the Northern Ireland government’s assertion to Whitehall that they were “no serious threat” would be completely untenable. Together with the tumultuous rise in violence since August 1971, Whitehall would have viewed Internment without Trial an unmitigated failure. The British Prime Minister, Edward Heath, would have had to step in and take direct control just as he was forced to do a few months later in March 1972.
The notes of Faulkner’s meeting with the British Home Secretary were discovered by the Pat Finucane Centre at the National Archives at Kew and are of especial importance to the family campaigners today. Not only do the records prove them completely correct for asserting that the McGurk’s Bar cover-up went straight to the top of the political establishment but they also again raise some serious questions regarding the so-called professionalism of the present British investigations (Historical Enquiries Team and Police Ombudsman Northern Ireland). Yet again it is the families and their friends in Human Rights activism who are uncovering such salient evidence and placing it in the public domain.
These archives prove that the Northern Irish Prime Minister:
• Deceived Whitehall that the massacre was the result of an IRA own goal
• Dramatically directed the RUC to check the associations of the innocent victims, dead and injured
• Was indeed briefed by the RUC
History is a cold judge so Faulkner’s deception is as stark as Maudling’s supposed gullibility. Faulkner avowed:
• His surprise if the IRA were able to keep up their campaign beyond February 1972
• His belief that he had “substantial Catholic support” which could not be vocal because of intimidation
• That the “political initiatives which had been taken had not yet had the opportunity to work”
A war that lasted a generation and led to well over 3000 deaths is the legacy of this cover-up. If only Brian Faulkner had upheld the basic Human Rights of our loved ones then, history may read differently now. If only…
On this, the 39th anniversary of the atrocity, the family members once more call on John Taylor, Baron Kilclooney, owner of Alpha Newspapers, to come clean about his role in the dissemination of black propaganda and disinformation at a time when we were burying our loved ones. As a Cabinet Minister under Faulkner and as the head of the Ministry of Home Affairs (with Security as his brief), there is no better living person to interview regarding this high-level political cover-up.
I personally and publicly challenge him to answer one question and one question alone:
Are you a patsy or a liar?
Review the relevant section of this startling archive here
Review full pdf version of archive here
