Families to sue Omagh police over ‘failures’

RELATIVES of Omagh bomb victims are to sue Northern Ireland’s police chief for investigative failings they believe let the killers escape justice.

Bereaved families have issued a writ against Police Service of Northern Ireland chief constable George Hamilton seeking damages and a declaration their human rights have been breached.

It is the latest legal twist in their two- decade quest for justice and comes ahead of next week’s 19th anniversary of the outrage, which claimed the lives of 29 people.

The families are already seeking to overturn the Government’s decision not to hold a public inquiry into claims the attack by the Real IRA could have been prevented if it had not been for a series of intelligence failings.

The writ against Mr Hamilton focuses on what happened after the bomb detonated on August 15, 1998 and why no one has been successfully convicted in a criminal court.

The relatives have already successfully sued four republicans in a civil trial that found they were responsible for the attack. The latest action has been taken against Mr Hamilton because he has responsibility for the actions of both his service and its predecessor, the Royal Ulster Constabulary (RUC).

Michael Gallagher, whose 21-year-old son Aiden died in the bombing, said the families

December 21, 2007 needed answers. ‘Here we are 19 years on and the criminals responsible for this are still walking the streets,’ he said. ‘There has been no punitive measures taken against any of them.

‘We can’t walk away and say “it’s just one of those things”. In our case it wasn’t just Aiden that died, all of us died that day, our lives have never been the same and we need answers.’ Stanley McComb, whose wife Ann was killed in the attack, said it was the hurt of missing her that drove him on. ‘Why should people get away with something like that?’ he asked.

‘If anyone decent breaks the law they are punished for it, and these people came in and murdered my wife in this town and it drives me on, there’s no way I am giving up.’

The legal action is issued in Mr Gallagher’s name on behalf of bereaved families from the Omagh Support and Self Help Group. It cites the findings of official inquiries and court proceedings that identified multiple failures in police investigations.

These include a 2001 report by police ombudsman Nuala O’Loan, which found that many evidential opportunities were missed and expressed concern that warnings of a likely attack passed to police by informants were not acted upon.

In 2007 Mr Justice Weir heavily criticised the way forensic evidence had been dealt with when acquitting South Armagh electrician Sean Hoey of the Omagh murders.

Seven years later, a 2014 report by police ombudsman Dr Michael Maguire highlighted delays in arresting suspects after the attack. He also found key intelligence was not disseminated from RUC Special Branch to detectives on the ground.

Fatal flaws in state evidence were also exposed when the prosecution of South Armagh bricklayer Seamus Daly for the Omagh murders was dropped before it reached trial last year.

The Omagh bombing inflicted the greatest loss of life of any terror atrocity in the history of the Troubles.