THE families of six people who were shot dead by police in Northern Ireland almost 30 years ago are planning to call John Stalker, a retired British police officer who led an investigation into the killings, as a witness at forthcoming inquests.
Stalker investigated claims that the Royal Ulster Constabulary (RUC) operated a “shoot-to-kill” policy against the IRA in Armagh. The former deputy chief constable of Greater Manchester Police examined three separate incidents in November and December 1982. He was removed from the inquiry in 1986 and suspended over allegations of association with criminals. He was later cleared and reinstated, but his report into the killings has never been published.
Mark Thompson, a spokesman for Relatives for Justice, believes Stalker’s evidence could be crucial in establishing what happened.
“Stalker investigated the RUC officers involved in these deaths. He knows what happened and we believe he has crucial evidence which needs to be heard by the coroner,” he said. A date for the inquests, due to be heard in Belfast, has yet to be announced.
Among the cases examined by Stalker and his team were the shootings of Eugene Toman, 20, Seán Burns, 20, and Gervaise McKerr, 31. The three unarmed members of the IRA were killed in November 1982 when their car was hit with 109 bullets on the outskirts of Lurgan, Co Armagh, after they allegedly drove through a police checkpoint.
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Toman and Burns had been suspected of planting a landmine on the shores of Lough Neagh, killing three RUC officers a month earlier. Three police officers were subsequently tried and acquitted of Toman’s killing.
The second incident investigated by Stalker was the killing of Michael Tighe, 17, who was shot dead as he entered a hayshed close to Lurgan, also in November 1982. Martin McAuley, one of his friends, was seriously wounded after the two youths were surprised by an undercover squad of RUC officers.
It later emerged that MI5 had bugged the shed. Much of Stalker’s investigation focused on retrieving the tape.
The third inquiry concerned the killings of Seamus Grew, 31, and Roddy Carroll, 22, two members of the Irish National Liberation Army (INLA), who were shot dead on 12 December on the outskirts of Armagh city. The RUC officers believed that Dominic McGlinchey, at the time the most wanted man in Ireland, was travelling in their car.
The RUC shot dead Grew and Carroll, who were both unarmed, saying that their car had failed to stop at a checkpoint. A police officer was later charged but acquitted of Grew’s murder. But during his trial in Belfast, the officer disclosed that his superiors had concocted an untrue cover story for him.
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The British authorities have always denied any “shoot-to-kill” policy existed and resisted calls from families to set up an investigation. The killings are being investigated by the Police Ombudsman of Northern Ireland, but its inquiry has been suspended pending the inquest hearings. A spokeswoman for Stalker, who is now retired, said he didn’t wish to comment.