Failures that mean a Troubles amnesty already exists

The prosecution of Soldier B, for the murder of 15-year-old Daniel Hegarty, shot twice in the head in Derry later in 1972, will also not proceed.

Since 1998 only a handful of prosecutions for Troubles-related offences have been successful.

In 2011 loyalist Robert James Clarke served less than two years behind bars for killing Catholic father-of-four Alfredo Fusco in a gun attack which took place at his cafe in north Belfast in February 1973.

Two years after the murder, Clarke gunned down a 58-year-old New Lodge Road woman, Margaret O’Neill, in a sectarian drive-by shooting as she walked along the road with her husband.

In the same year republican Gerry McGeough was convicted of trying to kill part-time UDR man Sammy Brush as he carried out a mail run.

McGeough, who claimed he had an ‘on the run’ letter, had parted ways with mainstream republicanism at the time and no letter was ever produced. He was sentenced to 20 years but again served two under the terms of the Good Friday Agreement.

In 2013 Seamus Kearney was sentenced to life for murdering John Proctor in September 1981. The 25-year-old RUC Reserve constable was shot dead just minutes after visiting his wife and their newborn son at the Mid Ulster Hospital in Magherafelt. Again he served two years under the terms of the 1998 agreement.

There have been no soldiers or former RUC officers prosecuted.

Attempts to use assisting offenders — so-called supergrasses — in the case of the murder of journalist Martin O’Hagan failed.

The trial of nine men accused of involvement in the murder of UDA leader Tommy English ended with them being cleared and walking free in 2012. They included the alleged former UVF leader in north Belfast, Mark Haddock.

The evidence of two brothers, Robert and Ian Stewart, who had been members of the UVF gang, was dismissed by the judge, given their own bad character and contradictory evidence.

It was the most expensive trial in Northern Ireland’s legal history.

This also had an impact on the cases involving loyalist supergrass Gary Haggarty, who admitted the murders of five people among hundreds of offences but served less than six years in prison despite his evidence never being used to convict a single person.

All of the above cases show the obvious flaws with our current justice system.

Even when a conviction is secured there is no fitting punishment for the crime.

There is no witch hunt of former veterans — the evidence just is not there to back up this claim. In fact, there is no hunt of anyone who played a role in our conflict, be they military, police, loyalist or republican.

In the meantime, the families of those murdered have hopes raised and dashed and raised again. They endure decades of emotionally gruelling justice campaigns only have door after door closed in their face.

Irish Foreign Minister Simon Coveney said at the weekend there should be “no distinction” between British soldiers and paramilitaries when it comes to Troubles prosecutions. There already is no distinction because no real effort has been placed into investigating any of the over 3,000 unsolved murders regardless of who was responsible.

The local political parties are said to be united against any plans for an amnesty. And rightly so. If evidence exists to convict then no civilised society should be ignoring that.

But it does not change the fact that there already is a backdoor amnesty caused by the lack of any real investigations into any killings.

Last week I pointed out that if there were, then cold case teams would be reviewing cases from 1998 back, relatively fresh cases with a real prospect of prosecution, instead of cases over 50 years old with many of the witnesses and perpetrators either already dead or so old they will be dead by the time any case ever reaches court.

The Government intends to end all criminal prosecutions. They may now be talking to the local parties but, mark my word, whatever they call it, they are going to implement an amnesty.

And in doing so they will not solve the open wound of our unresolved conflict, they will not heal the hurt of the past, or resolve the anger that exists.

So if this Westminster-driven ‘line in the sand’ is intended to bring the story of our conflict to an end, it isn’t going to work. The problem is, I’m not sure they care.