O'Loan to probe RUC abuse of Derry four
Investigators from the Ombudsman's Office have begun the hunt for secret RUC files which forced four Creggan teenagers into exile in 1979 and hung an unjust murder charge over them for two decades.
By Darinagh Boyle, Derry News, 06.10.2005
A team of detectives from forces in England arrived in the city this week to conduct separate interviews over two days with the four - now in their early forties.
But for the men to achieve justice they now need witnesses to come forward and provide alibi evidence on their behalf.
For Michael Toner, Stephen Crumlish, Gerard Kelly and Gerry McGowan, their nightmare began in early morning swoops a fortnight after a British soldier was killed at the foot of Wapping Lane on Valentines Day 1979.
Following three days of interrogation, mental and physical torture, the four signed statements implicating themselves in the killing.
The teenagers spent seven weeks on remand in Crumlin Road prison until, in a bizarre breach of practice, the four charged with murder were released on bail on April 26.
According to Paul O'Connor of the Pat Finucane Centre, all the evidence pointed to the fact that the four were wrongly charged - and crucially that the DPP knew it.
For the next 18 months they reported every day to the local police station.
The case went to trial in October 1980 and on the second day they took the hasty decision, prompted by advice from the bishop and their lawyers, to jump bail.
Now, Policing Ombudsman Nuala O'Loan wants to know exactly what went on in the interrogation rooms of Strand Road barracks that led four innocent young men to sign incriminating statements.
In 1982, after a long legal battle all four were acquitted of the murder charges but for over a year the DPP tried to hold an absconding bail penalty over them.
According to at least two of the victims the RUC interrogators who kicked, beat and coerced statements out of the four, destroyed their lives.
Both Michael Toner and Gerry McGowan suffered deeply from depression, flashbacks, panic attacks and extreme anxiety. The experience took a devastating toll on the lives of their families left behind in Derry and in turn on the men's wives and children.
And Michael Toner is convinced the injustice killed his father.
Vital evidence
The men are appealing to scores of potential witnesses who might have seen them on a Wednesday Valentine's Night in 1979. And they hope their story will jolt reaction.
Anyone who can provide any information relating to the whereabouts of all four of the men on February 14, 1979 are asked to make contact with the Ombudsman's Office on 90 828600, The Pat Finucane Centre on 71 268846 or Patricia Coyle in Harte Coyle Collins solicitors, Belfast on 90 278227.
In an interview room in their native Creggan earlier this week, two grown men wept bitterly as they relived the horrific three-day interrogation in Strand Barracks 1979 that robbed them of their future.
By Darinagh Boyle, Derry News, 06.10.2005
Gerry McGowan and Michael Toner were two of a group of four teenage neighbours who signed murder confessions wrung out of them by the fear and brute force of their interrogators.
None of the four had access to a solicitor until after the statements were signed.
On Tuesday the pair, now living in the South, returned to Derry to furnish detectives from Nuala O'Loan's Office with details of their arrest, the brutality they suffered at the hands of the RUC and the sequence of events that led them to jump bail for a killing they had neither hand nor part in.
But when Gerry McGowan sat down across a table from two investigating officers from the O'Loan's team - he was gripped by the same maelstrom of emotions that has haunted him and the others for almost 30 years.
With fear and anger welling in him, he broke down - as he had 26 years ago.
"I stepped into the interview room, took one look at the ex-officers on the other side of the table and broke down - I had to leave and come back in again.
(The officers referred to here are staff of the Ombudsman's Office and had no involvement whatsoever in the original interrogation.)
"I felt like I was a 17-year-old child again, alone and afraid - only this time I was angry as well.
"There were two police officers on the other side of the desk which was exactly as it happened in 1979 - I may as well have been re-enacting the whole thing. The only difference was that there was a tape this time. If there had been a tape running then we wouldn't have been in the situation we are in today.
"They can't give back to us what they took - screwing up our lives, destroying our families. But what I want to know is that there's a knock coming to their door (the RUC interrogators). They should be made to remember what they did to us."
Shortly before his arrest, Gerry had just signed a contract to play professional football with a major British club.
Eighteen years after their arrest all four were acquitted of the charges but received no apology or legal redress.
Gerry has only returned to Derry a handful of times since his acquittal.
This time he stayed in a city centre hotel - his only sister emigrated not long after he fled and his parents are since dead.
"The irony is that for 18 years when I couldn't come home my family were still here - now that I can come home there's no one for me to come home to. It's very painful just to walk the streets, go back to Oakland football pitch where I'd trained so hard. On my first visit back I was stricken by a panic attack - I couldn't leave the toilets in Foyle Street.
"The anxiety never went away - to this day if I get 3 hours unbroken sleep at night I'm lucky."
One of the most harrowing consequences of the charges was telling their children why their father couldn't visit their grandparents in Derry. Shortly after a BBC documentary on Gerry, his child was taunted at school about his father's alleged involvement.
But the deaths of Michael's father and Gerry's mother during the time they were on the run brought them to the very depths of despair.
"On the day my mother was buried the family brought her remains to Burt where the coffin was opened and I said my goodbyes. My wife and child went with the rest of my family back to Derry for Requiem Mass and I took the other road towards Buncrana alone. It was heartbreaking."
Shocked
According to both men Mrs O'Loan's officers were "flabbergasted" at the impact the retelling had on the victims - each interviewed separately.
"They were left in no doubt that something deeply, deeply traumatic went on in Strand Barracks over those three-four days to us," Michael Toner added.
"I couldn't bring myself to sit down. I paced the room for two - two and a half hours. At one point I had to grab the chair back, I thought I was going to collapse I was that bad.
"I just couldn't physically sit down facing those policemen. I couldn't even sign the tape at the end of it - just the thought of signing something belonging to the police - so I got the solicitor to sign it on my behalf."
Even in the proceedings leading up to their acquittal neither Michael nor Gerry had actually recounted the sequence of events and the emotions they awakened in such harrowing detail.
And Michael, who had been receiving professional help for depression and post traumatic stress disorder, said he would have to return to counselling when he returned to Waterford where he now lives with his family.
"I never ever went through a day like that in my life.
"It took me back to being a 17-year-old child again - that's how I felt.
"I had never spoken about it the way I did today (Tuesday) and things resurfaced that I'd never said before - things that were unimaginably painful. They violated our human rights - of that I have no doubt.
Fear
"What I remembered was the fear - a fear that never really left me. I remember vividly the police officers that were involved - they had a massive impact on my life. They destroyed me and I firmly believe the whole experience killed my father, simple as that."
According to the men, during the interrogation they were kicked and punched and their interrogators threatened to have their girlfriends and family members executed by the UVF.
They initially accused them of carrying out kneecappings but when they were worn down tossed in the murder charge.
Two days into the trial the four were offered a deal to plead guilty and accept 15 years imprisonment, or maintain their innocence and face a 30-year sentence for murder and other terrorist charges.
Fearing an unfair trial and on the advice of the Bishop of Derry, Dr Edward Daly, and their legal team they jumped bail.
Michael added: "We had no idea what was coming - we were children for God's sake - we'd never been in any sort of trouble, never been arrested before. We were like lambs to the slaughter.
"I can't speak for the rest of them - but I just wanted out of that barracks - away from the abuse. I didn't care where I was going."
Stephen Crumlish and Gerry Kelly were both interviewed by the Ombudsman's Office the following day.