The only man convicted in the 1998 bombing in Omagh, Northern Ireland, has won the right to a retrial. The attack was the deadliest in the country’s turbulent history, killing 29 persons and wounding 300.

On Jan. 21, the Court of Criminal Appeals in Dublin ruled that Colm Murphy, 52, was wrongly convicted of aiding Irish Republican Army dissidents responsible for the attacks. Murphy had been found guilty in January, 2002, of supplying two cell phones used by the IRA to deliver a car bomb to Omagh. He subsequently received a 14-year prison sentence.

Murphy’s lawyers filed an appeal that specified 45 grounds for potential quashing of the conviction. The appellate court accepted two of the complaints.

At the time of the appeals in December, 2004, the RTE reported that Atty. Michael O'Higgins said ESDA tests revealed that a garda interrogation team rewrote its interview notes after realizing it had inserted a false statement concerning Murphy's wife.

According to the RTE report, the false statement has suggested that his wife was a sister of a woman associated with a Real IRA figure.

O'Higgins said the Birmingham Six and Guildford Four appeals had been won with the results of ESDA tests that proved police had lied. He said the Special Criminal Court had dismissed the testimony of the two officers involved but failed to give any evidence to show that other officers had not been contaminated by their perjury.

The following transcripts are courtesy of the Northern Ireland Information Service

Program: Talkback
Date & Time 21.1.05 13.12
Subject Colm Murphy wins appeal
 

DAVID DUNSEITH

Michael, I was talking to Victor Barker earlier as well and he more or less said well it is another setback but you know and I know the law moves exceedingly slow. Not much consolation but that’s the way it is.

MICHAEL GALLAGHER

That is right. I mean it’s one of many setbacks over the past and I’ve known that and sadly we’ve had to pick up the pieces and move forward. Many of the families sat in the Special Criminals Court in Dublin and it wasn’t that pleasant.

Program: Talkback – Diarmuid Fleming
Date & Time 21.1.05 – 12.04
Subject Colm Murphy’s appeal

DAVID DUNSEITH

Colm Murphy has won his appeal against the Omagh bomb conviction.

So what happened in court this morning?

DIARMUID FLEMING

Well, there were 40 grounds for appeal, but today the Court of Criminal Appeal in Dublin allowed the appeal on two grounds only. Now the two grounds were essentially that interview notes which Colm Murphy’s legal team alleged were false, interview notes by Gardai, that the Special Criminal Court had failed to take sufficient account that the Gardai as was alleged, at the Special Criminal Court had perjured themselves, and the second ground of appeal under which Colm Murphy succeeded was that evidence of his previous convictions were brought up at the original trial and that this was actually an invasion of his presumption of innocence at the trial, and that the court should have taken account of this as well.

DAVID DUNSEITH

And what happened to the two Garda?

DIARMUID FLEMING

Well by coincidence today the two Gardai were actually in court, in a separate court, and they have been charged with perjury and they have been put forward to trial. They are pleading not guilty to those charges of perjury. How this originated was that it was alleged in interview notes, interviews when Colm Murphy was being interrogated, it was alleged that he had inferred to a relationship between himself and a woman called Sheila Grew, and she was supposed to be a girlfriend of a man called Daley. 

Now Mr. Daley was also suspected by Gardai of involvement in the Omagh bomb, so the allegation by Colm Murphy’s legal team is that there was an effort made by Gardai to infer a relationship between Mr. Murphy and other people involved, or suspected of involvement in the Omagh bomb. 

Now it turned out that Sheila Grew is no relation of Colm Murphy’s wife, and when this was discovered obviously the interview notes, when the Gardai discovered this, they sought to then alter the interview notes, and in special scientific tests known as Esda tests, it was discovered that the interview notes were not contemporaneous and that they had been altered.

DAVID DUNSEITH

So what happens now, a retrial?

DIARMUID FLEMING

There is going to be a retrial and also there will be a hearing on Tuesday as to the bail conditions of Colm Murphy. He was granted bail during his original trial but the bail conditions were extremely onerous. Now he said today, or his legal team said today, that his financial situation has changed considerably and that the original conditions he may not be able to meet. So there is a special hearing of the Special Criminal Court on Tuesday to decide as to what bail conditions might apply, but at the moment he’s been sent back to prison. 

I should also say that another ground of appeal was that, the previous convictions of Colm Murphy were brought up in the original trial, and it was said today at the Court of Criminal Appeal that the Special Criminal Court had not gone into the rigorous level of cross examination and of requirement of evidence into those convictions and their relevance to the Omagh atrocity. Just because somebody has been convicted of previous offenses didn’t necessarily draw a linkage between those offenses and the one for which he was charged, without further evidence being taken in court, and that didn’t happen.

Program: Talkback
Date & Time 21.01.05 – 12:08
Subject Colm Murphy’s appeal

VICTOR BARKER

Absolutely, it’s nearly 7 years now since we lost our eldest son, and all the other families lost their relatives, and you just wonder sometimes what position they had on that day, what human rights they had compared to the extensive (unclear) here which is given to people that are charged, but I can only say that obviously Mr. Murphy is entitled to his rights, he’s entitled to an appeal, and if that’s the decision of the court we have to abide by it. 

We have to abide by the law, and I sincerely hope Murphy will not be released on bail, and that the retrial will establish that once again that his conviction was correct in the first instance, although it’s now been quashed, and that he will be reconvicted.

DAVID DUNSEITH

Have you any thoughts specifically on the grounds for appeal, for the successful appeal?

VICTOR BARKER

Well, two grounds out of 40 does not sound a great deal to me, but the two grounds, and obviously the ones which we anticipated may well have succeeded, relate to the falsified interview notes, and also the weight given to Mr. Murphy’s previous convictions. I think the charge at the original trial said that Murphy was a hardened republican, and terrorist, and I think it did somewhat surprise me that so much weight was given to those convictions in the previous tria.

But this is the sort of man you’re dealing with, and I think the court are entitled to look at his past in the context of the current law in the South of Ireland, and to take weight of those previous convictions, but obviously we’re desperately disappointed at what happened with these 2 Garda officers.

DAVID DUNSEITH

Yes, and you as a lawyer yourself must have been aware in relation to the previous convictions in relation to the 2 Garda officers, you must have been very well aware of the pitfalls?

VICTOR BARKER

Absolutely. I mean I can’t honestly understand the reason why those notes were dealt with in that way, I don’t think it had any bearing on the ultimate conviction, that is my personal opinion, and obviously the opinion of the trial judges, you know, unfortunately as a defense lawyer you must grasp at any straw you can grasp at in order to secure an acquittal for your client. 

All I can say is that I am desperately disappointed at the conduct of those officers in the Garda Siochana, and sadly it’s not the first example of what I regard as somewhat breathtaking incompetence by the Garda. But having said that, the officer that I’m dealing with on a day to day basis, that always keeps me informed what is happening, I have no, or nothing but praise for the way that he’s conducted himself, and I think without his enthusiasm this conviction may not have been secured in the first place.

Program: BBC News 24 
Date & Time 21.1.05 10.28
Subject Colm Murphy’s appeal

NEWSREADER

Michael, what’s your response to this news?

MICHAEL GALLAGHER

Quite shocked really because many of the families went down and sat through the trial and although there was some alleged misconduct by some of the officers who interviewed this man, it’s our understanding that that evidence was withdrawn and therefore wasn’t part of the case. But nevertheless we have to accept as democrats the outcome of the courts but we will continue to watch with interest, you know it’s going to be another long, long difficult period for the families. 

NEWSREADER

Yes because people talk about closure but it’s hard to see where any closure has come from for you in relation to Aiden’s death. You’ve had these many years since the bombing and now we get the overturning of this conviction but now you have to sit through a retrial. 

MICHAEL GALLAGHER

That’s right. I mean it’s going to be very, very difficult. Total shock is my personal reaction but nevertheless we will continue to (unclear) those responsible for the Omagh bombing.

NEWSREADER

Obviously a very, very difficult investigation, one into which enormous policing resources have been poured on both sides of the border, do you feel the police have conducted the investigation as you would wish or do you feel disappointed at all that because of these failings in the collecting of evidence that the conviction doesn’t stand?

MICHAEL GALLAGHER

You know over the past six and a half years the Omagh investigation, both North and South, has been one that the families have found a lot of difficulty with. You know there’s been one turn after another but it appears that there is so much evidence, yet this is the only man ever convicted in connection with the Omagh bomb and here now it seems this awful atrocity, the worst actually in Britain since the Second World War apart from Lockerbie, and all the promises that were made at the time from the Taoiseach Bertie Ahern and the Prime Minister, nothing seems to have come of that.

NEWSREADER

Do you think at least that the police forces on both sides have learnt lessons from this terrible experience?

MICHAEL GALLAGHER

Well sadly if they have we haven’t seen these lessons, because we have continued to monitor the performance of both the Gardai and the PSNI and we have seen nothing to indicate, we’ve seen nothing but problems in this investigation. DNA was requested from the PSNI to the Gardai. It took 15 months for that to happen. 

There was an informant who could help the Omagh inquiry south of the border. We asked that he be available to the PSNI. Then we discovered that he was living in England and, you know, there’s been one twist, there’s been nothing but twists and turns and we’ve seen no resolve to this crime whatsoever.

NEWSREADER

And meanwhile those responsible for the death of your son and 28 others in that terrible carnage, we’re just seeing the pictures of the aftermath of it now on our screens, those people still walk free?

MICHAEL GALLAGHER

Well, it seems to me now that that’s the number of deaths that people in this country are willing to accept, willing to accept 31 innocent people including two unborn children, and not one person being held to account for that.