Regency shooting suspect buried in low-key send-off
SUSPECTED Regency Hotel gunman Kevin ‘Flat Cap’ Murray was laid to rest yesterday in a low-key ceremony with no IRA send-off.
The only paramilitary-style trappings was a cluster of men, wearing white shirts and black ties, walking behind his coffin as it was led into Strabane’s Church of the Immaculate Conception.
Inside the hearse was a wreath paying tribute to Murray from dissident vigilante group Republican Action Against Drugs (RAAD) in which the 47 year-old was allegedly involved.
The green and white ‘RAAD’ floral display was visible alongside an orange-coloured wreath with the word ‘Dad’ next to Murray’s coffin
Around 300 people attended the funeral Mass shortly after 10am where the gunman — who died last Wednesday after a battle with Motor Neurone Disease — was described as having faced his illness “bravely”. Parish priest Fr Declan Boland also told mourners in the church that the father of two, like many in the nationalist town, had been “caught in a vortex of [Troubles] upheaval”.
“During our lives we make many decisions, some good, some bad, some indifferent and in this regard, Kevin was no different than the rest of us,” he told mourners
Following the Requiem Mass, Murray’s coffin was carried out of the church by a number of men — including his son and brother — for interment in nearby Strabane cemetery.
A small number of former republican prisoners, who had served time with Murray in the ‘H’ block wings of the Maze prison, watched on as the coffin was lowered into the ground.
High-profile republicans notably stayed away from the service and burial, with the cortege made up mainly of friends and family.