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Rosemary Nelson 'passed information to IRA terrorists'

Tuesday, 2 December 2008

The inquiry into the murder of Lurgan solicitor Rosemary Nelson has heard allegations she passed confidential case information to IRA members.

The BBC also reported that a police officer also said Special Branch had information Mrs Nelson had been having an affair with Colin Duffy, described as a prominent IRA member.

Barra McGrory, solicitor for the Nelson family, said there was “no evidential basis for this belief”.

Mrs Nelson (40), died in a loyalist bomb attack in Lurgan in March 1999.

The inquiry heard evidence from a police officer who had been working in Special Branch in Lurgan in the mid-1990s.

He told the inquiry that he would not have considered Mrs Nelson a terrorist, as he believed a terrorist to be someone who is engaged in bombing or violence.

However, he described her as “certainly assisting terrorists in the area”.

He said he had no recollection of tasking a source to find out information on Mrs Nelson, but told the inquiry that Special Branch officers had received information that Mrs Nelson had been having an affair with Colin Duffy.

The officer said he had received intelligence that Mrs Nelson and Mr Duffy had met in a discreet location called Demesne Avenue, which was described as a loyalist area.

However, Mr McGrory, who represents Mrs Nelson's family, said: “There is no evidential basis for this belief which is apparently held on the strength of unnamed and unidentified sources who for all we know could have been from the loyalist community who were deliberately spreading these malicious rumours about Rosemary Nelson.”

Retired judge Sir Michael Morland is chairing a three-strong panel examining alleged security force collusion in the murder.

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27 Comments

Danny Boy hit the nail on the head.It seems that Irish Republicans think that their is one rule for them and another for everyone else.
IRA terrorists who were trying to murder security forces were killed by the SAS but they wanted to take the SAS to court for unlawful killing.
Hypocracy if I ever saw it.

Posted by Steve from Oz | 15.12.08, 19:14 GMT

Edgar Graham was a lawyer who was murdered by the IRA,he was a Unionist.
So HC got their facts wrong when they said that the only two lawyers killed during the Troubles were nationalists.
The IRA decided who they could murder by calling them legitimate targets.
So applying the IRA modus operandi,then their activists were legitimate targets.

Posted by Steve from Oz | 05.12.08, 17:07 GMT

@ Wise Up : "It seems workmen who fix PSNI bases are fair game for the IRA, yet solicitors should be exempt from loyalists... You can't have it both ways"

So you are saying that if one lot of terrorists murder these people, then the other lot of terrorists CAN murder those people, do I understand this correctly? That's the Loyalist version of Fair is Fair?
You are sick... surely murder is wrong in all its forms?

Posted by Danny Boy | 03.12.08, 12:00 GMT

I think it is a disgrace that the Media would even print this garbage to assist the goverment to smear this hard working mother and wife. I am not from a republican back ground but can see and hear and take note of all that goes on around me. If there was no wage packet at the end of each month for these so called politicians would they be there??, they are all getting old and tired now and want a quiet life, they have no fight left in them so they will except the crumbs of the british table and to hell with the ordinary people. To me their beliefs were not from the heart they are just achieving their own personal goals and anyone who stands beside them are only the sheep that follow. If the state want people to believe in them then they should stop all the coverups and make those responsible accountable for their actions... but this would never happen because then the world would see just what they are capable of.

Posted by armagh | 03.12.08, 11:09 GMT

She helped the IRA? Rumour? No evidence? OK. Collusion? Rumour. No evidence. People would do well to remember who they defend and why they do.

Posted by Good for the goose and no more cherry picking, warts and all. | 03.12.08, 00:14 GMT

This total B.S. This was a good woman doing a job she believed in.

Posted by Darren | 02.12.08, 23:30 GMT

All murder is wrong. There is no need for a smear campaign. It is the whole truth. There may be claims she was having an affair. But it has hit a sour note with republicans.

Posted by canuck | 02.12.08, 23:15 GMT

One thing a lot of republicans have to realise is that justice is a two way street, not just their battering ram to hammer the "Brits" with.

Every time something is said against them they throw their toys out the pram.....remember it was the very things they "fought" for, and largely won, that got them this far.

These allegations may be untrue, who knows.....but how does the everyday republican in the street know what exactly happened in the Rosemary Nelson affair...do they have crystal ball?

We must remember the people on this site who are so ready to criticize the RUC are in many ways like the RUC because many of the comments they make are pure bile. They have been fed sewage by their leaders for nearly 40 years, so after that length of time it is very difficult for people to snap out of such blinkered, biased and bigoted attitudes.

Posted by Dave | 02.12.08, 22:39 GMT

Bit early to accuse a smear campaign.Was it a smear campaign,when leading Sinn Fein members were accused of working with the Brits.

Posted by UNIONCRUISER | 02.12.08, 20:40 GMT

R u serious Rob? your kind is the reason why the province is the way it is! Typical Bigot!

Posted by Flim | 02.12.08, 20:08 GMT

everybody knows about the claims she was having an affair but also the same people know that the security forces were in the area hours before the attack.

what were they doing there? protecting her?

Posted by Anthony | 02.12.08, 17:07 GMT

To be fair, the story does not accuse her of being a terrorist, in fact special branch point that out specifically.
Pity it gets lost amongst the "woe is us" chants from the republican corner. Which to be honest is becoming rather amusing these days. Ohhh poor us....
Grow up lads, and get a grip.

How is it outrageous,
I'll tell you whats outrageous. The Omagh bomb, the Paul Quinn murder, the Robert McCartney murder. These people were innocents.
It seems workmen who fix PSNI bases are fair game for the IRA, yet solicitors should be exempt from loyalists... You can't have it both ways

Posted by Wise up | 02.12.08, 16:14 GMT

rob & G - what is this all about when your saying "wasting money on enquires?" Can i ask if your mother died due to a car bomb being attached to her car would you not like to know who planted it and who was involved?
and for you Rob, RUC were the best polce force in the world???? i really dont see how you can come to this conclusion, first of all it was mostly unionists, ruled by unionists, so i would say it was biais...

Posted by phat tony | 02.12.08, 16:09 GMT

HC - you don't include judges in your definition of lawyers then? Judges Conaghan, doyle and Lowry spring to mind.

Posted by neil | 02.12.08, 15:41 GMT

Given the involvment of Special branch with loyalist death squads - is anyone really surprised they continue to throw mud at Rosemary Nelson?

Posted by ger | 02.12.08, 15:25 GMT

Well said Peter, or another couple of hundred million being wasted on an inquiry. The RUC were the best police force in the world without a doubt and they were taken away from us to appease republicans.

Posted by rob | 02.12.08, 14:11 GMT

Its very easy to dismiss evidence if does not suit your political view point. Thankfully its not up to people on this site to decide what is truth and what is not.

Posted by Sam | 02.12.08, 14:09 GMT

This is truly outrageous. A smear campaign against a murdered woman who can obviously no-longer defend herself, with zero evidence to back it up their scurrilous accusations, only hearsay, and worst of all, an attempt to make murder most foul seem excusable by the same despicable people who gave us the real version of 'a licence to kill'...

Posted by Nostradamus | 02.12.08, 14:08 GMT

There were a number of lawyers killed during the Troubles, including Edgar Graham outside Queens University in 1983 so a number of comments on this thread are inaccurate. It would be appropriate to suggest that the two highest profile cases are the most discussed, but were certainly not the only examples of lawyers being murdered during the Troubles.

Some might argue that the fact that there was no accusation of state involvement, coupled with the fact that Graham was a unionist has led to this case being somewhat 'forgotten'.

Posted by Leonidas | 02.12.08, 13:57 GMT