1 Monday, 11th December 2000.
2 (9.50 am)
3 MR CLARKE: Sir, I should record that
4 Sir Louis Blom-Cooper is here this morning who is
5 instructed on behalf of NICRA. We now have Mr Fox.
6 MR MICHAEL FOX, sworn
7 Questioned by MR CLARKE
8 LORD SAVILLE: Mr Fox, if you look to your
9 right you will see the Tribunal members with me talking
10 to you. As you have probably gathered by now, the
11 questions will come from Counsel who are sitting in
12 front of me. All I would ask you to do, if you would,
13 is to try and remember to keep your mouth fairly close
14 to the microphone so that everybody can hear what you
15 have to say.
16 MR CLARKE: Mr Fox, do you have in front of
17 you your statement, which may we have on the screen at
18 AF26.1?
19 A. Yes.
20 Q. And are the contents of that statement true
21 to the best of your knowledge and belief?
22 A. I have only one point that I wish taken off
23 the grid map: line C, "soldiers positioned on roof".
24 Q. May we look at AF26.7 on the screen, which is
25 the map?
1 A. Yes. That line at C.
2 Q. Yes?
3 A. That does not exist.
4 Q. I was going to ask you about that. Okay, we
5 will come to that when we get to that spot in the body
6 of your evidence.
7 A. The reason that it was not changed, I did not
8 actually open this statement until recently, it is, you
9 know, just ...
10 Q. Do not worry about it, it is not a problem.
11 A. Okay.
12 Q. You describe in paragraph 2 of your statement
13 at AF26.1 attending mass at the Long Tower Chapel?
14 A. Yes.
15 Q. Then coming back from mass.
16 In paragraph 3 you say that you were employed
17 as the Personnel Officer at Essex International?
18 A. That is correct, yes.
19 Q. What did that company do?
20 A. They made wiring harnesses for motor
21 vehicles.
22 Q. They made what exactly?
23 A. Wiring harnesses.
24 Q. When you say, could we have on the screen
25 AF26.1, which is your statement, that part of your
1 plant had been taken over by the British Army, does
2 that mean that the British Army were in your plant or
3 they were making use of what you manufactured?
4 A. No, no, they had an encampment in the same
5 compound. This was based at Bligh's Lane.
6 Q. You describe coming back to your home in
7 Ferguson Lane, and seeing a soldier outside your
8 house. Can we just see where that is on the map? If
9 we could have Q6 on the screen; this is a map of
10 Derry. I can find Ferguson Street.
11 A. Ferguson Lane, Ferguson Street, it is all the
12 one.
13 Q. It is all the one, is it?
14 A. Yes, I live close to the bottom end of it
15 where that yellow arrow is.
16 Q. You came back to your home there and a
17 soldier --
18 A. Sorry, I came along from Saint Columba's
19 Church -- you can see it marked there -- I came along
20 Barrack Street, down Bishop Street, down Ferguson
21 Street and that is how I came home.
22 Q. So I am absolutely sure, what is known as the
23 Long Tower Church?
24 A. That is where it is there.
25 Q. Is that where I have marked it in red, marked
1 RC Church, near Long Tower Street?
2 A. Yes.
3 Q. You describe in your statement how the
4 soldier prevented you going into your house?
5 A. That is correct.
6 Q. And said that he wanted to search you?
7 A. Yes.
8 Q. Did he say why he wanted to do either of
9 those things?
10 A. No.
11 Q. You were then taken off to the encampment at
12 the Foyle Bridge?
13 A. Yes.
14 Q. Could we have on the screen bundle C, page
15 1828.6? What I am going to show you, Mr Fox, is the
16 best picture I can possibly find of what I think is the
17 encampment you are talking about. It is attached to
18 the statement of a soldier.
19 Could I have control again? We can see in
20 this rather bad copy is photograph the bridge over the
21 Foyle?
22 A. Yes.
23 Q. And the Foyle Road, which has been marked to
24 the left of the bridge as we look at it?
25 A. Yes.
1 Q. Is the encampment you are talking about the
2 one which somebody has marked with a circle with the
3 letters, A, B and C in it?
4 A. Yes, it is in that area.
5 Q. It is in that area?
6 A. Yes.
7 Q. You were searched there by the RUC?
8 A. Yes.
9 Q. Nothing was found and you were allowed to --
10 A. Return home.
11 Q. Right. If we could go to AF26.2, if we could
12 have that on the screen. In paragraph 10 of your
13 statement you describe getting ready to attend the
14 march and going on the march with two friends of yours,
15 Patrick O'Mianain, who is the next witness?
16 A. Yes.
17 Q. And I am afraid I cannot pronounce
18 properly --
19 A. Liam O'Kievely.
20 Q. Was there somebody called Liam Cavanagh with
21 you?
22 A. That is the same, Liam O'Kievely.
23 Q. If I could then come to your description of
24 what happened when you walked east along William Street
25 and if we could maximize paragraphs 15 and 16 of your
1 statement. You describe walking east along William
2 Street and seeing some soldiers on the roof of a
3 derelict building in front of the GPO sorting office.
4 It is at that point in your statement that you drew a
5 line on the attached map, which is not there?
6 A. No, and there was no derelict building there
7 either, you know, it was a wide open space.
8 Q. Were the soldiers you saw, therefore on the
9 roof of the --
10 A. They were on the roof. There was a roof; the
11 sorting office roof was there somewhere, that is it.
12 Q. If we look at your map at AF26.7, you
13 describe being at position "A"?
14 A. Yes.
15 Q. And seeing the boys at the position marked
16 "B", and I take it they must have been throwing stones
17 from that position toward the sorting office roof?
18 A. They were, yes.
19 Q. You then described in your statement how the
20 stone-throwing went on for a couple of minutes and you
21 continued east along William Street and reached
22 position "D" when there seemed to be a blockage at the
23 junction. If I could have control, you describe
24 yourself as getting as far as where you have had marked
25 "D" and seeing the blockage at "E".
1 Had you seen a lorry at this stage?
2 A. No, we were at the latter end of the march
3 and all in front of us would have been people, you
4 know, all the way down, that -- there would have been a
5 blockade, but it would have been a blockade of people.
6 We were not standing as individuals at point D (that is
7 where we were located on the march), but there was a
8 lot of people ahead of us.
9 Q. You then described in your statement moving
10 on to the wasteground by Bradley's Taxis to take cover
11 from gas?
12 A. Yes.
13 Q. And rubber bullets flying into the area which
14 you think were fired from soldiers on the roof of the
15 GPO?
16 A. Well, they could not, you know. There was no
17 other way that they could have got to where they were.
18 Q. Right, and you describe yourself as taking
19 cover at the point that you have marked as "F"; do you
20 see that?
21 A. I see that, yes. What has to be taken into
22 account here is that this happened 28 years ago.
23 Q. Yes, of course.
24 A. And the original statement actually was made
25 28 years ago; I did not even remember making that. The
1 other statement was made 2 and a half years ago and
2 things were, maybe they are blurred, maybe they are
3 not, I do not really know, but I can only tell you what
4 basically I remember.
5 Q. Yes, of course. If we look for a moment at
6 your joint statement, AF26.6.
7 (10.00 am)
8 A. Yes.
9 Q. We can see that your joint statement said
10 this:
11 "Approximately 3.50 we passed Stevenson's.
12 CS gas was affecting everyone in the vicinity. We
13 moved on down to the former site of the Richie's
14 factory and two paratroopers were sighted on the
15 sorting office roof and in the derelict house on the
16 left-hand side. Three boys were throwing stones, but
17 on being spoken to by stewards and marchers, stopped
18 and returned to the main body."
19 A. That is correct.
20 Q. I think in your present statement your
21 recollection is of considerably more than three, about
22 10 to 12?
23 A. The Eversheds statement is, I would say, a
24 lot more padded. This one was made within days. The
25 Eversheds statement took a considerable amount of
1 time. They questioned us for somewhere like six hours
2 to make this other statement and they went through
3 things in greater detail, but I mean, even then memory
4 would not be that great.
5 Q. Then in your statement at the time, you said
6 this:
7 "We reached Rossville Street corner and
8 CS gas was overcoming people."
9 A. Yes.
10 Q. "We moved back up William Street and turned
11 into the entry facing Richie's site. Two boys of about
12 16 or 17 were throwing stones. Three rubber bullets
13 were fired at us and were taken by various people as
14 souvenirs"?
15 A. That is correct, yes.
16 Q. It appears to have been your recollection
17 then that you, firstly, went down to Rossville Street
18 and came to the corner and came back again and that the
19 place you turned into was opposite the Richie's site?
20 A. Yes. You would not be talking a massive
21 amount of distance there, you know, you would only be
22 talking of 10 to 15 yards. You would not be talking
23 half a mile or something like that.
24 Q. What is your present recollection as to where
25 you turned in?
1 A. We turned into an opening.
2 Q. An opening?
3 A. Yes, that is basically it.
4 Q. If we could go back to paragraph 21 and
5 AF26.3? You describe there being with Paddy O'Mianain,
6 crouching by the wall:
7 "With our backs to the wall and looking
8 towards the GPO roof"; would that be looking in an
9 easterly direction, in the direction of the
10 Rossville Street/William Street junction?
11 A. No, you would be looking in the direction of
12 Little James Street, you would be looking towards the
13 sorting office roof.
14 Q. You said:
15 "I could see the rubber bullets hitting the
16 wall behind us and Paddy O'Mianain bent down to pick
17 one of the rubber bullets up when suddenly high
18 velocity shots began hitting the walls above our
19 heads. I knew that they were live bullets."
20 Can you recollect approximately how many live
21 bullets you heard hitting the wall above your heads?
22 A. Several, but like to say an exact figure, no.
23 Q. How close to you did the bullets land?
24 A. Close enough to frighten everybody that was
25 there and to make everybody that was there want to get
1 out of it.
2 LORD SAVILLE: Mr Fox, it is the Chairman
3 talking to you. Do you have any recollection now of
4 how many people were around you at this time?
5 A. One, Paddy O'Mianain, I do not recollect
6 anybody else. I had only one thought in mind and that
7 was to get out of there. I was running for survival.
8 MR CLARKE: You refer in this passage in your
9 statement to what must have been very dramatic, a
10 number of live rounds being fired close to you?
11 A. Yes.
12 Q. "Only a few inches" above your heads. There
13 is not any reference to that in your statement of 1972;
14 do you know why that is?
15 A. Not really, no.
16 Q. Perhaps you were not asked the right
17 questions?
18 A. Maybe not, but there again you know in 1972
19 the statements would have been taken -- like I do not
20 even remember making a statement in 1972.
21 Q. I wonder if I could show you a photograph of
22 the area which is covered by the map; can we have P201
23 on the screen? That shows the sorting office roof?
24 A. Yes.
25 Q. And the wasteground in front of Richie's?
1 A. Yes.
2 Q. And the junction and the wasteground opposite
3 Richie's and what looks like a gap in between the
4 houses where I am pointing. Does that picture bring
5 back any memories as to where you were or where the
6 bullets landed that you are describing?
7 (Marked in blue)
8 A. We were back somewhere in here (indicating),
9 and where your original blue arrow is here, right, we
10 were back in here. There is a wall or a building in
11 here, just in there somewhere or a platform -- it is a
12 wall anyway -- it stopped whatever came towards us.
13 Q. I think we may be able to find that. If we
14 look at P199, this is looking at it from a slightly
15 different area.
16 A. Yes, what is that there, (indicating), that
17 square?
18 Q. I am not sure from up above; that is a
19 motorcar?
20 A. But there is a -- was there a building in
21 there or a square in there at some point in time?
22 Q. There may well have been. You recollect, as
23 I understand --
24 A. I recollect lower down.
25 Q. Am I pointing at approximately the place
1 where you recollect being?
2 A. We would not be behind the building, we would
3 be alongside that building that you are --
4 Q. Would you like to point? Can we set it so
5 that it will make a mark in blue?
6 A. Sorry, that has gone the wrong way. We were
7 somewhere about there. There is a wall or something
8 there at some point or other, you know. (Indicating)
9 Q. Could we save that as AF26.9? You then
10 describe, if we could -- let us leave this photograph
11 on the screen for the moment --
12 A. Sorry, could I go back there to the grid
13 map? On the grid map --
14 Q. AF26.7, please and could we maximize the area
15 we are looking at, please?
16 A. What is that?
17 Q. I am afraid that is a misleading feature, are
18 you referring to the square --
19 A. Yes.
20 Q. That is a building that used to be there.
21 I am told it was an ice-house at some stage, but was no
22 longer there in 1972 and has confused, I am afraid, a
23 number of people by its present on the map?
24 A. Yes, but was there a wall of it still there?
25 Q. It does not look as if from the photographs
1 there was, but it may be there was a wall to the right
2 of it as you look on the -- or the remains of a wall
3 somewhere to the right of it, but I am not sufficiently
4 expert on photographs to be able to tell.
5 A. Nor am I, like, but there was definitely
6 something behind us that stopped everything, so it had
7 to be concrete.
8 Q. Keeping that grid map on the screen, you
9 refer in paragraph 3 in your statement to seeing east
10 down William Street, Damien Donaghy fall at about
11 position "H", which we can see on your map is a
12 position about three buildings to the left as we look
13 at the plan before Aggro Corner, just south of William
14 Street?
15 A. Yes.
16 Q. And hearing him say "I am shot, I am shot",
17 and seeing his body falling and then him being picked
18 up?
19 A. Yes, he was picked up, yes.
20 Q. You have your previous statement attached and
21 if you look at AF26.6, which is your previous
22 statement, and if you could highlight paragraphs 3 and
23 4, you describe there how:
24 "... a young boy of 16 or 17 standing at the
25 corner of the bar in William Street fell and shouted
1 that he had been shot. We thought he had been hit with
2 a rubber bullet. He shouted again and a group of us
3 moved towards him and helped him away to cover. The
4 bullet had gone right through his leg."
5 That is similar to what you say in your
6 statement at paragraph 23, save that you described the
7 young boy as standing at the corner of the bar in
8 William Street.
9 If you go back to the map at AF26.7 we have
10 had a lot of evidence of people seeing a boy shot at a
11 bar in the direction to which I am pointing in red,
12 that is to say the building at the northwest corner of
13 this wasteground.
14 (Marked in red)
15 That seems to be consistent with your
16 recollection moments ago of where you were standing
17 somewhere to the right of the square that appears on
18 the map. I am wondering whether, quite understandably,
19 you have simply transposed in your mind the place
20 between 1972 and 1998 or 1999?
21 A. That could certainly happen, but what I have
22 marked at the point "I" is there was a bar there, but
23 that is where my mind recollects John Johnston coming
24 round that corner shot. Now he was the second person
25 I had seen shot that day, but the young lad could have
1 been shot there, I do not know.
2 Q. Before Damien Donaghy was shot, you had heard
3 the shots that were a few inches above your head?
4 A. Yes.
5 Q. Those shots, where did they appear to be
6 coming from?
7 A. Well, they were coming towards us, therefore,
8 they were coming from the direction of possibly the
9 sorting office or somewhere around there, but --
10 Q. Go on --
11 A. No, no, go ahead.
12 Q. Had you heard any shots going in the opposite
13 direction?
14 A. No.
15 Q. Or any explosions, or something that sounded
16 like an explosion?
17 A. No, all I heard was rubber bullets and
18 CS gas.
19 Q. Right. At the time when you and Paddy
20 O'Mianain could see rubber bullets hitting the wall
21 behind you, that is to say before the live shots, was
22 stone-throwing still going on at soldiers to the north
23 of William Street?
24 A. I could not honestly say.
25 (10.15 am)
1 Q. If we could then go back to AF26.4, you
2 describe at the top of the page -- if we could
3 highlight down to paragraph 24 -- seeing the body of
4 Damien Donaghy being carried west up William Street and
5 you say that you believe he was taken to Raymond
6 Rogan's house, but you are not sure where that was,
7 then within seconds of that happening seeing a man
8 walking east, whom you found out later was Mr Johnston,
9 at about the position "I" which is just coming round
10 the corner of the --
11 A. It is a bar.
12 Q. A bar?
13 A. Yes.
14 Q. I think it is called the Nook Bar or
15 sometimes called Sweeney's Bar -- In any event at the
16 northwest of the wasteground we are looking at on the
17 map?
18 A. That is correct, yes.
19 Q. You then describe in paragraph 24 what he was
20 wearing and seeing blood oozing from his leg?
21 A. Yes.
22 Q. If we go to paragraph 25, you describe going
23 towards him to help him and moving with him for about
24 2 feet, and a number of other people then came forward
25 to assist and he was helped into the wasteground.
1 At paragraph 26 you describe how there was
2 still a large amount of people on William Street,
3 probably hundreds and everyone was looking for safety.
4 Was the march, so far as you recollect, still
5 in progress in William Street at this time or were
6 there just stragglers left behind; what was the
7 position?
8 A. What was happening on William Street, I do
9 not know. I was looking for cover, I was looking to
10 get out, I was not looking around. I seen a lot of
11 people, but what happened further down William Street,
12 I do not know.
13 Q. Then you say in paragraph 27:
14 "Since initially crouching at position 'F'
15 when the first live rounds were fired, there did not
16 seem to be a lull in the shooting. The shots I could
17 hear whilst standing back at position 'F' for the
18 second time were semi-automatic fire. There seemed to
19 be a lot of gunfire from the direction of the GPO
20 roof."
21 Now, without of course being exact, can you
22 tell us over what sort of period you recall hearing
23 live rounds being fired?
24 A. I would say no more than seconds.
25 Q. So when you refer to "the absence of a lull
1 in the shooting", what you mean is that there was a
2 burst of shooting that lasted for seconds and there was
3 not any lull in that burst?
4 A. No, no lull.
5 Q. You then decided to leave and you went to
6 Mr O'Mianain's mother's house in Dove Gardens.
7 Could we have Q2 on the screen, please? I am
8 afraid this map a rather faint, but we can see Free
9 Derry Corner is where I am pointing in blue and
10 Dove Gardens is where I am also pointing in blue to the
11 left of it, is that right.
12 (Marked in blue)
13 A. That is correct, yes.
14 Q. That is where you made your way and you
15 describe yourself as going along Eglinton Terrace,
16 which I think is there; is that right?
17 A. That is correct.
18 Q. To Blucher Street?
19 A. Yes.
20 Q. Which is further down.
21 A. Yes.
22 Q. And then getting down to Dove Gardens and
23 part of the route is shown on the map, which is
24 attached to your statement?
25 A. That is correct, yes.
1 Q. If we could go to AF26.5, which has paragraph
2 32 of your statement and if we could highlight that?
3 You describe seeing a young boy in Blucher Street with
4 blood pouring out from the point of his nose. I am
5 going to show you a photograph, P779.
6 A. That is him.
7 Q. That is him?
8 A. Yes.
9 Q. That is Michael Quinn, who certainly ended up
10 in Blucher Street. I do not think it matters, but
11 Mr O'Mianain's recollection is that you saw him in
12 Fahan Street?
13 A. I do not know, I remember seeing him.
14 Q. You remember seeing him, yes, one could
15 scarcely forget.
16 If we go back to AF26.5, paragraph 33, you
17 describe seeing the boy get assistance?
18 A. Yes.
19 Q. And making your way to a first floor flat in
20 Dove Gardens and everybody panicking, lying down on the
21 floor and hearing shooting, and you say:
22 "We were lying on the living room floor and
23 the living room window faced the Derry Walls and I was
24 frightened to look out of the window. The shots were
25 coming from the walls."
1 When you say that is it simply because you
2 heard shots from that direction when you were lying
3 down, or what appeared to come from that direction when
4 you were lying down below the living room window?
5 A. I would say it was just, you know -- the fear
6 was making me lie on the ground and possibly fear was
7 also making me hear a lot of things.
8 Q. It is the direction from which the sound
9 appeared to come that causes you to say that the shots
10 were coming from the walls, is it?
11 A. I do not really know.
12 Q. Did you see anybody fire from the walls?
13 A. No, I did not look out the window.
14 Q. Those are all my questions, but there may be
15 some people have others.
16 Questioned by MR O'HANLON
17 MR O'HANLON: Briefly, sir, could I have
18 AF26.3, paragraph 18, up on the screen, please? If
19 I can bring you to the second half of that particular
20 paragraph, you indicate:
21 "I was waiting for the march to turn right
22 south down Rossville Street and proceed to Free Derry
23 Corner"?
24 A. That is correct, yes.
25 Q. I am Paddy O'Hanlon representing the
1 Northern Ireland Civil Rights Association. My
2 apologies for that, I should have introduced myself.
3 Just to return to that particular sentence:
4 can you indicate to the Tribunal -- I know it is 28
5 years ago -- was there any reason why you spoke in
6 those terms about what you were waiting for?
7 A. Well, I was part of a march, like, I was
8 waiting on people in front of me to proceed to where we
9 were all going.
10 Q. Yes. Had there been any indications earlier
11 in the proceedings, at the start of the march or during
12 the march, that Free Derry Corner was the destination?
13 A. The original destination was Guildhall
14 Square.
15 Q. In relation to this particular sentence, that
16 you were waiting for the march to turn right, south
17 down Rossville Street and proceed to Free Derry Corner,
18 was it your understanding or was there anything that
19 occurred during the march that indicated that it was
20 going to Free Derry Corner?
21 A. We were told that it was being diverted to
22 Free Derry Corner.
23 Q. When were you -- I know it is 28 years ago --
24 A. It would have just passed through a crowd,
25 you know, there was no actual person stood up and said
1 "listen this march has now been redirected", not that
2 I ever heard. All that I knew is we were stopped, we
3 were waiting to go down to Free Derry Corner.
4 Questioned by MR GLASGOW
5 MR GLASGOW: Mr Fox, may I trouble you once
6 again with the map AF26.7? In fairness 26.9 is the one
7 you have marked; could we have AF26.9? That is the
8 position, the first of the little blue arrows where you
9 told Mr Clarke that you thought you remembered where
10 you were?
11 A. Yes.
12 Q. Looking at that photograph now, can you
13 recall at all what the area in which you were standing
14 looked like; what was there around you as you stood
15 there?
16 A. As I stood where the blue arrow is?
17 Q. Yes.
18 A. Nothing.
19 Q. It was an open space?
20 A. Except for a wall.
21 Q. And where were you, Mr Fox, in relation to
22 the wall?
23 A. We were just in front of the wall.
24 Q. So, ignoring the second arrow --
25 A. There was a wall somewhere, I can remember
1 that. There was something that stopped whatever was
2 being fired at us, and it was a wall, it was not
3 something that moved, it was a solid structure.
4 Q. I wonder if you would mind looking now at the
5 map that you helped Eversheds with, which is AF26.7?
6 A. Yes.
7 Q. This is not a criticism at all, because
8 I bear in mind fully your point about the 28 years.
9 A. Yes.
10 Q. You see, if we could enlarge the central area
11 there, you indicated at point "F" --
12 A. That is correct.
13 Q. -- as being the position where you thought
14 you were?
15 A. The reason for that was, when I was making
16 the statement to Eversheds, I was looking for a wall.
17 I was looking for a structure that had to be behind us.
18 Q. I entirely accept that. Can I help you on
19 one other matter, Mr Fox, if you look at the position
20 "H", which is to the north of "F"; that is the
21 position in which you believed Mr Donaghy was at the
22 time when you saw him fall?
23 A. There could be a confusion there because of
24 the point "I" where John Johnston is, that is the bar,
25 and that is where we are basically at, but there was a
1 wall. What I was seeking was a wall, there had to be a
2 wall to stop -- to allow us to see what was happening,
3 there had to be some structure behind us.
4 Q. Are you sure of this much, that wherever it
5 was you were standing, and I am not disagreeing with
6 your blue arrow you have marked on the photograph.
7 A. Yes.
8 Q. But wherever it was Donaghy, the young man
9 who you saw shot, fell somewhere between you and the
10 area to the north where you had seen the soldiers?
11 A. Damien Donaghy fell somewhere between point
12 "H" and point"I"; he could have fallen there. That is
13 not a big amount of space.
14 Q. No, and I was not being critical, Mr Fox, but
15 wherever it was in your mind's eye that you can see him
16 falling, it is between you and the soldiers whom you
17 were conscious of at the GPO?
18 A. Yes, yes.
19 Q. There were no buildings between you, between
20 Donaghy and the soldiers, there was open space?
21 A. Where we were was open space, except for the
22 structure that was behind us.
23 Q. Yes, and looking to your north you could see
24 the young man Donaghy and between him --
25 A. Take it easy, take it easy a moment. At
1 point "I" where John Johnston was, John Johnston came
2 round the building, he was not -- that gentleman
3 Johnson was shot with a building behind him, he was not
4 shot in open space. Young Donaghy was shot, I would
5 say, facing the buildings possibly that are marked
6 "laundry" or something there, but those are buildings;
7 he was not shot, how would you say, he was not shot in
8 an open space.
9 Q. Was there open space to the north of Donaghy
10 between him and the soldiers by whom you believe he was
11 shot?
12 (10.30 am)
13 A. I do not get your point.
14 Q. I am sorry, I will ask the question again:
15 was there open space between Donaghy and the soldiers
16 by whom you believe he was shot?
17 A. The soldiers that I seen were in about the
18 sorting office.
19 Q. Yes, we already have your evidence --
20 A. Facing that area there was all open space
21 over to where we were, but there was interlaced
22 buildings, there were spaces and there were buildings;
23 there was buildings that had been demolished and there
24 were still buildings standing, you know, it was not
25 just a complete wiped out space that whole area; there
1 were still buildings in that area.
2 Q. Were there buildings between the soldiers and
3 Donaghy, or was it open space?
4 A. Open space --
5 Q. Completely open space?
6 A. Yes, the buildings would have been behind
7 Donaghy.
8 Q. Putting your mind back to where you think you
9 were in relation to the soldiers, using the simplest
10 possible terms, you were behind Donaghy, Donaghy was
11 between you and the soldiers?
12 A. I would think that, yes.
13 Q. Very roughly in a straight line?
14 A. No, he was not in a straight line.
15 Q. In your mind's eye now, as you looked to the
16 position where the soldiers were in the GPO, was
17 Donaghy to your left, to your right or straight ahead?
18 A. You are asking me to look at my mind's eye;
19 my mind's eye at this point in time is -- I do not
20 really want to remember this.
21 Q. I can well understand that. Again, it is not
22 a critical question, Mr Fox, but do you have a clear
23 recollection now of the events of the day?
24 A. Oh, yes.
25 Q. You do?
1 A. It is a recollection that has been brought
2 back by what is happening here; it is something I do
3 not want to remember.
4 Q. I appreciate that, but do you have --
5 A. I remember what happened on the day, yes.
6 Q. Do you have a picture in your mind now?
7 A. I do, yes.
8 Q. You can see Donaghy standing in front of you?
9 A. The most vivid picture is John Johnston and
10 the wee lad that was shot in the nose, and the other
11 point is pure panic.
12 Q. Help the Tribunal, Mr Fox, about Mr Johnston,
13 let us deal with him first: am I right in thinking your
14 recollection is that as you are looking towards the GPO
15 building and the soldiers?
16 A. Yes.
17 Q. Mr Johnston is to your left?
18 A. Mr Johnston is to my left, yes. Mr Johnston
19 was coming down William Street, I do not know whether
20 Mr Johnston was in the march or not, but he was coming
21 down from the cathedral, he was heading down -- coming
22 down towards us and he came round the corner of that
23 bar there, but he was shot when he came round that
24 corner.
25 Q. When you say "round the corner", Mr Fox, when
1 he emerged into your vision as he came round the
2 corner?
3 A. Yes, but there was buildings there. He was
4 not shot in open space, he had a building --
5 Q. Behind him?
6 A. Behind him.
7 Q. That is your clear recollection?
8 A. Yes.
9 Q. Simply, so you can deal with what other
10 people have said and may say, I want to put what other
11 people have said to you, again not in any criticism of
12 you, simply so you can comment on what other people --
13 a number of other people have told the Tribunal that
14 Donaghy appeared to be approximately in the position
15 where your "I" is on the plan?
16 A. Yes.
17 Q. Can you look at that?
18 A. Yes.
19 Q. And that Johnson was more in the position
20 where you have put your blue arrow on AF26.9?
21 A. No. My recollection for Mr Johnston is,
22 Mr Johnston came round that corner because I moved
23 towards him.
24 Q. But the one matter which you are -- that is
25 not meant to sound rude -- one matter you are clear
1 about, Mr Fox, is that there was a wall behind you?
2 A. Yes, there was.
3 Q. If it be the case that in the open space we
4 have been talking about between what is marked as "the
5 laundry" and the building around the corner of which
6 Mr Johnston came --
7 A. Yes.
8 Q. -- if there was no wall in that space, then
9 you could not have been there because you are sure of
10 the wall?
11 A. I am sure of a wall.
12 Q. Yes.
13 A. And the reason I am so sure of the wall is
14 the fact that the bullet struck a wall, otherwise they
15 would have had to kill somebody.
16 Q. When do you think it is that you first had a
17 recollection of the bullets hitting that wall?
18 A. When you say "when", what exactly do you
19 mean?
20 Q. Putting to you the same question, Mr Fox,
21 with respect that my learned friend, Mr Clarke, put to
22 you: if it be right, please have a look at it, AF26.6.
23 You have told Mr Clarke you have no
24 recollection of making that statement?
25 A. That is correct.
1 Q. If we look at the top, it does appear that
2 the details about you would have been right. I do not
3 read them out of course. If you look at the top
4 right-hand corner: your age, occupation and address?
5 A. Yes.
6 Q. They have those right?
7 A. I was not 30, no, I was younger.
8 Q. I was not going to be rude.
9 A. Appearances can be deceiving, but ...
10 Q. It is also right to say that Mr O'Mianain
11 would have been with you?
12 A. He was, yes.
13 Q. Throughout the time?
14 A. Oh, he was.
15 Q. May I ask, was he a close friend?
16 A. He is, yes.
17 Q. He still is?
18 A. Yes.
19 Q. And you converse with him regularly?
20 A. Not regularly, no.
21 Q. Forgive me, I am acutely conscious of the
22 fact it is I who is the foreigner here, but when you
23 converse with him you do you converse in English?
24 A. I converse in English.
25 Q. That is his usual language?
1 A. It is my usual language.
2 Q. It is not meant to be rude, please, I do
3 assure you. Again I say I am conscious of the fact
4 I am the foreigner, there is a reason for asking you --
5 A. The reason that the question is being put is
6 that Patrick O'Mianain would do me the courtesy of
7 speaking to me in English when he knows I do not speak
8 in Irish.
9 Q. I am sure he will do the same for me because
10 I speak even less than you.
11 Mr Fox, the point that was put to you very
12 fairly and openly by my learned friend, Mr Clarke, was
13 that there was no mention in this statement which
14 appears to be an accurate record, at least of your
15 address and your occupation?
16 A. Yes.
17 Q. Of what one would have thought was almost the
18 most sensational thing that happened you on the day,
19 bullets hitting a wall behind you?
20 A. Not really.
21 Q. Could you help me on that?
22 A. I can help you in the sense that this
23 particular statement would have been made within maybe
24 days, you know, panic, different things, but the
25 sensational thing is that it happened, you know. It is
1 not something that I have suddenly dreamt up, I was
2 there, I seen them.
3 Q. Mr Fox, I was not -- for the record, make it
4 absolutely plain, I was not suggesting for one moment
5 you were making something up --
6 A. No, no, what I am saying to you is you are
7 asking about the point, the most sensational thing
8 about -- the most sensational thing of that day was the
9 fact that I came out of it alive.
10 Q. But the fact that you had been personally
11 shot at and that bullets had hit a wall behind you is
12 not something that would have been out of your mind
13 days after the incident had taken place?
14 A. My mind, at that point in time, was that
15 I was still alive, I was a survivor.
16 Q. Do you think that fact, as you say quite
17 rightly, that sensational fact that has stuck in your
18 mind may have clouded your memory about other matters?
19 A. Not really.
20 Q. Not really?
21 A. No, other matters, what do you mean by "other
22 matters"?
23 Q. For example, the number of boys who you saw
24 throwing stones; you had a very clear recollection it
25 would appear, you put a specific number. If you look
1 at the second paragraph that we have in front of us,
2 you actually --
3 A. Two boys.
4 Q. Yes: do you now in your mind's eye see two
5 boys or a handful of the size, a number such as that?
6 A. Honestly, you know, after 28 years, could you
7 say that -- how many people you seen on a specific
8 day?
9 Q. If it helps out a matter of pure courtesy to
10 you, Mr Fox, the answer is no, I would not pretend
11 I could, that is why I hope, with equal courtesy, I am
12 asking you you can?
13 A. Giving courtesy to both sides, you know, the
14 fact that it could have been two -- I would say it was
15 two, if I said it was twenty-two days after it, then it
16 was two.
17 Q. Again, being entirely open about it yourself,
18 Mr Fox, your evidence would be that your recollection
19 two days afterwards was likely to be more accurate than
20 it is today?
21 A. Oh, yes. I hope so.
22 Q. Could I take you back to your current
23 statement, the one that you made two years ago,
24 AF26.4? This is the Eversheds statement again, Mr Fox,
25 just to remind you.
1 A small point, but it may help you with your
2 recollection: at the top of the page, which is the
3 second half of paragraph 23, if you see that that is
4 highlighted. Your recollection, entirely I accept
5 honest, your "belief" as you express it, that Donaghy
6 was taken to Raymond Rogan's house, now where do you
7 think you got that belief from; something you saw,
8 something you were told at the time, or something you
9 have been told recently?
10 A. Oh, no, I do not know, but it could have been
11 taken anywhere.
12 Q. Of course he could, that is why I am only
13 asking you about what you told Eversheds. Again,
14 I stress I do not doubt honestly, but where do you
15 think you have got your belief --
16 A. You know I must have asked somebody or been
17 told by someone that he was taken to Raymond Rogan's
18 house.
19 Q. Where was that?
20 A. It was somewhere about -- it is in the area,
21 it is -- I do not know.
22 Q. You do not know?
23 A. I do not know where Raymond Rogan actually
24 lived, but I know he lived somewhere in the area where
25 all the commotion was.
1 Q. It is quite easy, is it not, Mr Fox, to take
2 on board something you have been told about which you
3 have actually no knowledge whatsoever and may be
4 completely wrong and misleading, and yet honestly to
5 express that as a belief; would you accept that?
6 A. I would, in the sense that somebody could
7 have said to me he was taken to Raymond Rogan's house.
8 As I said, I believe he was taken to Raymond Rogan's
9 house.
10 Q. Although today you have no recollection of
11 where you got that information from at all?
12 A. No.
13 Q. Thank you very much, Mr Fox.
14 Questioned by MR ELIAS
15 MR ELIAS: Mr Fox, AF26.6, your 1972
16 statement, I do not want to go back over any old
17 ground, but you have told the Tribunal you do not have
18 a recollection of where you made it or to whom; do you
19 have any recollection now as to why you and your friend
20 Paddy O'Mianain made a joint statement?
21 A. No, I would say that both of us had decided
22 we would go and make a statement, but like, at this
23 point in time, I cannot tell you where I made the
24 statement or to whom I made the statement. All I can
25 tell you is I made a statement.
1 Q. Can you even tell us how it was that you knew
2 at the time that there was somewhere or someone to whom
3 you should make a statement?
4 A. No, there is no point in me sitting here and
5 saying that you were told to go here, there, I do not
6 remember.
7 Q. In relation to your Eversheds statement?
8 A. Yes.
9 Q. Could you answer this question about that:
10 before making that statement, did you speak again to
11 your friend Paddy?
12 A. Paddy O'Mianain and I would be friends. We
13 would speak to each other, maybe not on a regular
14 basis, but we would speak frequently.
15 Q. You would have spoken about this Tribunal and
16 why it was that you may be called to give a statement
17 to Eversheds, would you?
18 A. Paddy and I made the statement to Eversheds.
19 He was in this building with me when we made our
20 statements.
21 Q. Before you made them, I am not suggesting
22 there is anything wrong with it, you had discussed
23 matters between you, had you?
24 A. No.
25 Q. Not at all?
1 A. No.
2 SIR ALLAN GREEN: I have no questions.
3 MR TOOHEY: Mr Fox, could I ask you a
4 question, please? In paragraph 21 of your statement,
5 AF26.3, you speak about bullets hitting the wall behind
6 you?
7 A. Yes.
8 Q. The following paragraph you speak of your way
9 out being blocked by a high wall of a derelict
10 building; is that the same wall that you are speaking
11 about or are they different walls?
12 A. It is the same wall.
13 Questioned by MR CLARKE
14 MR CLARKE: Could we have P199 back on the
15 screen?
16 (10.45 am)
17 If we look at this enlarged photograph and if
18 you would like to see the original in which it is
19 clearer, I will show it to you -- there does appear to
20 be what, even to my untutored eye, looks something like
21 the wall of a building; do you see that?
22 A. I do, yes.
23 Q. I am just wondering whether or not that may
24 be the wall that you are trying to tell us about?
25 A. I do not honestly know.
1 Q. Sorry?
2 A. I do not really know, you know.
3 Q. Thank you very much.
4 LORD SAVILLE: Thank you, Mr Fox, very much.
5 Somebody will show you how to get out.
6 MR CLARKE: The next witness is Mr O'Mianain
7 who wishes to give evidence in Irish through an
8 interpreter.
9 MR PADRAIG O'MIANAIN, sworn
10 Questioned by MR CLARKE
11 (through the interpreter)
12 MR CLARKE: Mr O'Mianain, you will see on the
13 screen in front of you your statement in Irish, which
14 is AO56.19. Do you have a copy of your statement in
15 both Irish and English?
16 A. No, I only have made one statement, and that
17 was a statement in Irish.
18 Q. Have you seen a translation of the statement
19 into English?
20 A. Yes, I have.
21 Q. Are the contents of your statement true to
22 the best of your knowledge and belief?
23 A. Yes, they are, there is just one slight
24 mistake. I said that Liam Kievely was with me at the
25 time of the shooting, but he was not, it was another
1 boy called Patrick O'Carolan.
2 Q. Do you also have a map -- can we have on the
3 screen AO56.19?
4 A. Yes, I do.
5 Q. Which has the arrows on it we see on the
6 screen?
7 A. Yes, I do.
8 Q. You describe in your statement going to the
9 Irish language mass at Nazareth House and returning
10 afterwards to see your mother at 26B Dove Gardens?
11 A. That is right.
12 Q. You then describe going along the march and
13 drawing level with Stephens bakery and seeing soldiers
14 at the GPO sorting office at the east of the
15 Presbyterian Church?
16 A. That is right.
17 Q. And in a derelict house?
18 A. Yes.
19 Q. Which you have marked on the map?
20 A. That is right.
21 Q. You then describe in paragraph 8 of your
22 statement stewards in the march restraining 3 or 4
23 eleven or twelve-year-olds who were throwing stones at
24 the soldiers on the top of the GPO sorting office roof?
25 A. That is right.
1 Q. You then go on to describe walking eastwards
2 down William Street to the junction with
3 Rossville Street?
4 A. That is right.
5 Q. Finding there was gas at that junction?
6 A. That is true.
7 Q. And then coming back in the direction that
8 you came to point 4, which appears on the map which we
9 can see on the screen?
10 A. That is right.
11 Q. In paragraph 10 of your statement you
12 describe seeing another gang of 3 or 4 boys, this time
13 between 15 and 17 years old, standing in the area which
14 you have marked with a "3" and throwing stones at
15 soldiers on the roof of the GPO?
16 A. That is right.
17 Q. And by this time hearing the sound of rubber
18 bullets being fired?
19 A. Yes, I did.
20 Q. Did those rubber bullets appear to being
21 fired at the boys who were throwing stones?
22 A. They were.
23 Q. Can you tell us at this stage approximately
24 how many people there were around in William Street?
25 A. The area in which I was standing there were
1 maybe 50 or more.
2 Q. Then you and others took cover from the
3 bullets by going into the wasteground to approximately
4 the position which you very helpfully marked as
5 position "5"?
6 Interpreter could you repeat that, it was a
7 bit long.
8 You then described how you moved with others
9 into the wasteground to the south of William Street to
10 approximately the position which you have marked with
11 the number "5"?
12 A. That is exactly right.
13 Q. You then go on to describe standing there
14 watching the young men throwing stones and runner
15 bullets bouncing towards you?
16 A. Yes.
17 Q. Did any come close to you, any of those
18 rubber bullets?
19 A. Yes, they did, they were bouncing all around
20 us.
21 Q. You then describe how you, whilst facing
22 north, bent down to pick up one of the rubber bullets?
23 A. That is right, that is true. (Witness
24 nodding)
25 Q. And then in paragraph 13 of your statement
1 you say that a bullet hit the wall to the west of where
2 you were standing?
3 A. Yes, on the west side, yes. Sorry, it was
4 behind me as opposed to the west side.
5 Q. Behind you. Is your recollection therefore
6 of there being a wall behind you?
7 A. There was some sort of hut.
8 Q. May we have on the screen P199? This is a
9 photograph of the area which is shown on your map, and
10 the approximate position of where you have put point
11 "5" on your map is where I am indicating with an
12 arrow?
13 (Marked in blue)
14 A. Yes, roundabout there.
15 Q. I am wondering whether you can identify the
16 wall which you recollect being hit by a bullet?
17 A. It would be just there. (Indicating)
18 Q. That is the wall on the east side of the
19 wasteground?
20 A. That is okay, yes. Can I come in here,
21 please?
22 Q. Yes, of course, please do.
23 A. I did not see a bullet hitting the wall;
24 other people saw it and they told me. I bent down to
25 lift a plastic bullet which was bouncing around, but
1 other people were quicker than me and they retrieved
2 the rubber bullet as a souvenir but I was told that a
3 bullet hit where my head was just before that.
4 Q. The bullet that you were trying to get was a
5 rubber bullet?
6 A. Yes, it was a rubber bullet.
7 Q. Did you see it?
8 A. The rubber bullet?
9 Q. Yes.
10 A. Yes, I did.
11 Q. Is the sequence this: that somebody said that
12 a bullet had hit the wall, you bent down to pick it up,
13 but somebody else got hold of it?
14 A. I am not saying that the rubber bullet hit
15 the wall. The rubber bullet was coming across,
16 bouncing across and I attempted to pick it up. Another
17 bullet hit the wall, a live round, or so I am told.
18 Q. You saw the rubber bullet you were looking
19 for?
20 A. (Witness nodding) I did, yes.
21 Q. And you were told about the live bullet?
22 A. That is right, that is exactly right.
23 (11.00 am).
24 Q. Then you describe in paragraph 14 seeing a
25 boy at the position marked "6". If we could have
1 AO56.19 on to the screen. You saw a boy at the
2 northwest corner of the ground?
3 A. Just there. (Indicating)
4 Q. You say that you would have been aware of him
5 standing there but not taken a close look at him and
6 that he was not one of the boys you had seen earlier
7 throwing stones at the soldiers?
8 A. No, he was not.
9 Q. Was he close to those who were throwing
10 stones?
11 A. He was not, they were in the middle of the
12 street.
13 Q. The boys who were throwing stones, did they
14 stay in roughly the same position or did they move
15 around?
16 A. They were moving around from that area.
17 Q. They were moving around in William Street in
18 front of the wasteground in front of the Presbyterian
19 Church?
20 A. They were trying to throw the stones in that
21 direction. (Indicating)
22 Q. Then you describe how the young man said that
23 he was hit a second time and you moved towards him?
24 A. That is true.
25 Q. Had you seen him immediately before he said
1 "I am hit" or not?
2 A. I knew he was there, he was standing there.
3 I do not know if I looked at him just directly before
4 he was hit.
5 Q. It has been suggested that as well as stones
6 being thrown in a northerly direction, either nail
7 bombs, or some sort of canister that looked like a nail
8 bomb, were thrown across William Street across the
9 wasteground to the north; did you see anything like
10 that?
11 A. I did not see anything like that. If I had
12 seen anything like that, I would have went out of there
13 double quick.
14 Q. You then describe seeing the young man
15 standing up clutching his thigh and four of you trying
16 to turn him round and take him to safety, moving
17 forward in a southerly direction?
18 A. Yes, that is true.
19 Q. And then as you walked a few feet away,
20 turning round and seeing a man at point "7" on your
21 map?
22 A. Point "7" would be out on the footpath.
23 Q. In fact in the way you have drawn it on the
24 map, it is just to the south of the footpath?
25 A. The man was walking that direction, on the
1 footpath. (Indicating)
2 Q. The man had been walking in an easterly
3 direction on the footpath?
4 A. He was.
5 Q. Had he turned into the wasteground when you
6 saw him?
7 A. I thought he had been tripped up. The ground
8 was sort of broken up and I thought he had been
9 tripped.
10 Q. At the moment when he appeared to have been
11 tripped, was he off the pavement and into the
12 wasteground or not?
13 A. He would be right on the edge of the
14 wasteground. You have to remember that people were
15 throwing stones and that rubber bullets were coming in
16 our direction, so he would be sort of keeping in to
17 stay out of the way.
18 Q. Then you went over to help the older man?
19 A. I did, yes.
20 Q. And you accompanied the two groups carrying
21 the older and the younger man?
22 A. I was, yes.
23 Q. To a house in Columbcille Court?
24 A. I went as far as them to the house, but I did
25 not go into the house with them.
1 Q. Then I think you took the route that we can
2 see, shown very helpfully by the arrows on the map?
3 A. Yes.
4 Q. And you got to the position marked "9"?
5 A. That is true.
6 Q. Where you saw a young man accompanied by a
7 Knight of Malta bleeding profusely from the nose?
8 A. That is true.
9 Q. If we have a look at P779; do you recognise
10 that man?
11 A. I would not recognise him now. His hand was
12 up over his face.
13 Q. If we could go back to AO56.19, the map? You
14 describe in paragraph 22 of your statement crossing the
15 Bog Road and up, am I right in thinking, the Bog Road
16 is what appears on this map as Fahan Street West?
17 A. Yes, that is it, that is what we always
18 called that street, we did not call it Bogside Road.
19 I did that to show that this is a street I am referring
20 to rather than the whole area.
21 Q. And you reached the point we see in the far
22 left-hand corner of the screen, point 10?
23 A. Yes.
24 Q. You describe in paragraph 22 of your
25 statement that:
1 "Being conscious of the continuing sound of
2 rifle fire and being able to hear bullets being fired
3 in rapid succession --
4 A. Yes.
5 Q. -- south from the William Street direction";
6 when you say that do you mean that you heard bullets --
7 could I have control -- apparently fired from William
8 Street in the north down in the direction that I have
9 shown on the map?
10 A. I do not know which direction they were
11 coming from. I know they were coming from behind me.
12 I was going this way. (Indicating)
13 Q. Which way is "this way"?
14 A. Across this way and this sound was coming
15 from this area. (Indicating)
16 Q. You were going across Fahan Street West
17 towards point "10" and you heard the shots coming from
18 the area of William Street at its junction with
19 Rossville Street?
20 A. From that area.
21 Q. Then you got back to your mother's flat at
22 Dove Gardens?
23 A. Yes.
24 Q. And lay on the floor in the sitting room?
25 A. Yes.
1 Q. Could we have Q2 back on the screen? This is
2 the best map we have for these purposes and it shows
3 Dove Gardens now in the middle of the screen.
4 A. Okay.
5 Q. According to the numbering on the map, number
6 26 is down here, is that right?
7 A. That is it, the last one there.
8 Q. So it is very close to the Lecky Road as we
9 can see here?
10 (Marked in red)
11 A. Yes.
12 Q. That is presumably why you were able to see
13 people diving to the floor all over the Lecky Road?
14 A. Yes.
15 Q. You describe seeing a boy try to escape the
16 shooting by climbing up the steps to the Long Tower?
17 A. Yes.
18 Q. If I could have control again. The
19 Long Tower Church on the map is this one, is it not,
20 which I have marked with a green arrow?
21 (Marked in green)
22 A. Yes.
23 Q. And presumably there are some steps up from
24 the Lecky Road to take you up to the church?
25 A. Yes, just there. I cannot mark the map.
1 Q. Yes, you can. I can take away all these
2 arrows. Can we have control for Mr O'Mianain, in
3 blue? If you press on the screen either with a stylus
4 or with a finger --
5 A. (Indicating)
6 Q. There are some steps up where you have
7 pointed?
8 A. Just there.
9 Q. Can we save that as AO56.27.
10 You describe later in your statement how the
11 shooting died down and you walked to Westland Street to
12 the West End Hall?
13 A. Excuse me, sir, that did not happen when the
14 shooting had died down; that happened later.
15 Q. How much later?
16 A. At least a couple of hours.
17 Q. I wonder if it would be possible for you to
18 identify to me where the Westland Hall is; could we
19 have on the screen P238?
20 (11.15 am)
21 That is not on our screen yet. No, it
22 sometimes takes a little time. This is a photograph
23 which shows Free Derry Corner in about the middle and
24 Westland Street beginning with the Bogside Inn on the
25 right at the corner with the Lecky Road and extending
1 from right to left. Can you identify the Westland Hall
2 on that photograph?
3 A. Yes, that is it there. (Indicating)
4 Q. That one, that is to say, the left hand arrow
5 on what you have just marked?
6 A. Yes.
7 Q. Can we preserve that image as AO56.31?
8 We know that shortly afterwards, indeed the
9 next day I think, you made a joint statement together
10 with Michael Fox?
11 A. I did, yes.
12 Q. Do you recall how you came to make that
13 statement?
14 A. How?
15 Q. How it came about; did somebody ask you --
16 A. I think -- I suppose people were talking
17 about making statements. Myself and Michael were
18 together most of the time. We decided to put one in.
19 Q. Do you know who was organising the making of
20 statements?
21 A. I think it was civil rights, whoever was in
22 charge of it.
23 Q. Those are all the questions I want, but there
24 may be others.
25 Questioned by MR GLASGOW
1 MR GLASGOW: Mr O'Mianain, would you be kind
2 enough to look at AO56.19? Did you yourself make the
3 markings on this map, Mr O'Mianain?
4 A. I do not remember.
5 Q. Could you look at the building marked 1B we
6 see the top, on the north side of William Street? Can
7 you remember now what, if anything, did you see going
8 on there?
9 A. I did not see much going on there. I was
10 informed while we were walking down that there were
11 soldiers inside the old place and I saw them, I saw
12 them, but I did not bother with them.
13 Q. They were doing nothing that drew your
14 attention to them?
15 A. That was when we were walking down the road.
16 Q. Did they ever do anything that you were
17 conscious of?
18 A. I do not think so, I did not see them doing
19 anything. I was inside. I was within the confines of
20 the wasteground and I could not see that old house.
21 Q. You were in the position which is marked as
22 "5"; between there and 7, is that right?
23 A. Yes.
24 Q. If rubber bullets had been fired by the
25 soldiers in the position in that building, fired from
1 that building towards where you were standing on the
2 wasteground, they would have struck, would they not,
3 the wall behind you?
4 A. I would say they probably hit the wall on my
5 right-hand side there and bounce off that.
6 Q. Did you see any rubber bullets strike that
7 wall?
8 A. I do not recall now.
9 Q. Could you point to the wall, if there be one,
10 which you believe was struck by rubber bullets?
11 A. I think they were all struck by rubber
12 bullets. Rubber bullets were coming from that
13 direction, from the north.
14 Q. You believe that all the rubber bullets were
15 fired from the building which is just to the north that
16 we can see marked "the GPO sorting office"? I am so
17 sorry, do you see the building now marked the GPO
18 sorting office?
19 A. That area, there were also soldiers
20 roundabout here at the old church.
21 Q. But your recollection is that all the rubber
22 bullets that you saw were fired from that northerly
23 direction?
24 A. I would say so.
25 Q. Were you conscious of the rubber bullets
1 before they bounced, or did they go so fast that you
2 really only saw them after they had bounced?
3 A. Of course you did not see them all, but the
4 odd one would be bouncing about and you would see them
5 quite easily.
6 Q. If there is evidence from other people that
7 rubber bullets were fired from the building that we see
8 here marked 1B, would you deny that, would you disagree
9 with that or simply say "I do not know"?
10 A. I do not know.
11 Q. Would you go to your statement, now,
12 Mr O'Mianain, AO56.4? I think you have your hard copy,
13 it is at the bottom of AO56.23, but it will not do for
14 us on the screen, it will not do for me anyway. Do you
15 prefer to work off the Irish statement?
16 A. Of course.
17 Q. But I think you told us that you personally
18 checked the translation?
19 A. I did not say that, I said that -- I said
20 I had seen the translation. I did not read it.
21 Q. Very well. In your paragraph 13, which we
22 have highlighted in English -- please check the
23 original which is AO56.23 for your benefit -- you
24 describe rubber bullets making a certain noise. You
25 say in your last sentence:
1 "Rubber bullets made a hollow noise when they
2 hit the bricks and mortar, therefore the others were
3 convinced that this was a live bullet."
4 Did you personally agree with that?
5 A. I did not, I thought they were joking.
6 Q. The noise that you heard convinced you that
7 rubber bullets were being fired?
8 A. By the time that rubber bullets would have
9 been coming beside me, they would have been nearly
10 dead, in other words, they were not bouncing about,
11 they were just lying there. This thing about the live
12 round, I did not hear it, I did not sense it at all,
13 but I was told that when I bent down to try to lift up
14 the rubber bullet, that this thing hit the wall. I did
15 not see it. I did not see it, I did not hear it, I did
16 not sense it.
17 Q. Did you hear any live rounds that you
18 believed were live rounds being fired at that time?
19 A. I did not.
20 Q. Thank you very much.
21 Questioned by MR ELIAS
22 MR ELIAS: Mr O'Mianain, would you look,
23 please, at your statement in our version AO56.5,
24 paragraph 21 and the penultimate sentence?
25 A. One second, please. Okay.
1 Q. You are referring to the young man bleeding
2 from the nose and you said this:
3 "At the time, I concluded that he had been
4 shot across his nose from east to west from a position
5 on the City Walls. I do not know why I thought this to
6 be the case ...".
7 A. The thing about that was, if that boy was
8 running away from the shooting which was at the bottom
9 of Rossville Street and if his nose had been injured,
10 it must have come from the walls.
11 Q. That was your conclusion at the time?
12 A. Exactly, yes.
13 Q. And that was your reasoning?
14 A. That is what I thought at the time, but
15 I have to say that we were making up our minds very
16 quickly at the time because we knew that there was
17 danger and we wanted to get out of the way. That meant
18 that we could not go down to Lecky Road, it was not
19 safe.
20 Q. May I ask you about something quite
21 different: you took statements in 1972 from witnesses?
22 A. I did, yes.
23 Q. Do you remember at whose direction you took
24 statements?
25 A. I said before I do not remember, but
1 I offered to do it.
2 Q. And offered to whom?
3 A. Word came that they were taking these
4 statements down at the school beside us, that is Saint
5 Patrick's Primary School, and I went into the place and
6 I said that I would help them out.
7 Q. When you took statements were you in
8 possession of any plans or maps?
9 A. No, I was not.
10 Q. So you were not in a position, were you, to
11 assist any of the witnesses?
12 A. No. I have to say at this point that I am
13 from this area, I was born and bred in this area, in
14 Rossville Street, so I had a very good knowledge of the
15 area.
16 Q. Did you assist those witnesses who may not
17 have had such a clear knowledge?
18 A. The people I was talking to -- I cannot be
19 totally sure about this -- they came from the same
20 area.
21 Q. You yourself made a joint statement?
22 A. Yes, true.
23 Q. Was there any reason for that?
24 A. There was no special reason. I cannot think
25 now exactly why we did it. At the time everything and
1 everybody were a state of total confusion and
2 I thought, and Michael probably at the time, since we
3 were together most of the time that we should do it
4 together.
5 Q. As a statement-taker yourself, did you in
6 fact write this statement and submit it?
7 A. I do not think so, I think it was Mickey who
8 wrote it, but I am not totally sure, though maybe it
9 was somebody else who took the statement from us.
10 I think in the statement there are some
11 misspellings. If you look at the bottom of the letter
12 there is a word in it, "definite", but I am perfectly
13 capable of spelling that word correctly.
14 SIR ALLAN GREEN: No questions, thank you,
15 sir.
16 LORD SAVILLE: Could I ask a question: could
17 you look at paragraph 16 of your Eversheds statement?
18 In the English version, that starts by saying:
19 "Within seconds of his second shout,
20 I reached the young man. He was still standing up,
21 facing north and clutching his thigh."
22 Could you now look at your NICRA statement at
23 AO56.1 --
24 INTERPRETER: Sorry, I did not catch that.
25 What sort of a statement?
1 LORD SAVILLE: NICRA statement. It is
2 AO56.1. It is on the screen now, the third paragraph,
3 if you could highlight that. That says:
4 "Then a young boy of 16 or 17 standing at the
5 corner of the Bar at William Street fell and shouted
6 that he had been shot."
7 Can you help us with your present
8 recollection; did that young man fall or was he still
9 standing up when you reached him?
10 A. I do not recall, I thought -- I think he was
11 standing up, but I do not recall.
12 Questioned by MR CLARKE
13 MR CLARKE: One last question: do you
14 remember any of the other people who, together with
15 you, helped the young man?
16 A. No, I do not remember. I probably would
17 remember at the time, but I do not remember them now.
18 MR HOYT: Could you describe how you went
19 about taking the other statement, Mr O'Mianain?
20 A. I knew these statements had to be taken at
21 Saint Patrick's Primary School. I went down and there
22 were tables laid out and chairs, and I sat there and
23 there were a lot of people there and a lot of people
24 writing down statements. I went in amongst them and
25 helped them.
1 MR HOYT: So each individual wrote out in
2 their own handwriting their own statement; is that
3 correct?
4 A. I do not recall, I do not know. I do not
5 know if it was me or the people themselves who wrote
6 the statements, I do not recall.
7 MR HOYT: In any event there was no
8 typewriter available at that stage?
9 A. No, there was nothing like that, pen and
10 paper.
11 MR HOYT: Were tape recorders or dictaphones
12 used to record the evidence?
13 A. No, there was not.
14 LORD SAVILLE: So at some stage all these
15 statements would have been in handwriting, although you
16 are, as I understand it, you cannot remember whether
17 they were written by the person giving the statement or
18 by the person taking it; is that right?
19 A. I would say there was probably -- there were
20 probably both. There were people there who did not
21 want to be writing and in that case I was perfectly
22 prepared and happy to write the statement for them.
23 LORD SAVILLE: But by one person or another,
24 all these statements were originally in handwriting; is
25 that right?
1 A. In my case, yes.
2 LORD SAVILLE: You were there; were the other
3 statements being written in handwriting by somebody?
4 A. I do not remember anybody using a typewriter.
5 LORD SAVILLE: The answer is they must have
6 been written in handwriting?
7 A. Well, that is my opinion.
8 LORD SAVILLE: Well, you were there; can you
9 not remember what was happening?
10 A. There was a lot of tables there, a lot of
11 people there. I was working with one or two people who
12 were giving me statements and I did not have any sense
13 of what was going on at the other tables; I was too
14 busy doing the job that I was doing.
15 LORD SAVILLE: When you were doing that job,
16 you were writing the statements?
17 A. Well, again, I do not recall exactly whether
18 it was me who was doing the writing or the people who
19 were actually giving the statements, but at the time
20 I would have been perfectly happy to write the
21 statement.
22 LORD SAVILLE: If I come back to a question
23 I asked a minute or two ago: in the case of the
24 statement that you were taking, either you wrote them
25 in handwriting or the person who was giving you the
1 statement wrote it in handwriting?
2 A. That is true.
3 LORD SAVILLE: Thank you very much.
4 Mr Clarke, do we have any of these
5 handwritten statements?
6 MR CLARKE: Yes, we have quite a large number
7 of handwritten statements and we have, I believe, also
8 carried out a check, not in relation to all of them,
9 but in a sample quantity to see the congruence or
10 otherwise between the handwritten statement and the
11 typewritten statement.
12 LORD SAVILLE: Thank you.
13 MR CLARKE: Thank you very much,
14 Mr O'Mianain. Thank you very much, Mr Interpreter.
15 I am afraid we now have a hiatus because the
16 witness who was due to come next has been detained at
17 work. There may have been a misunderstanding about
18 dates. Suffice it to say that we do not, I am afraid,
19 have anybody until the afternoon session because those
20 who have been scheduled for the afternoon will be here
21 in the afternoon. As we anticipated one further
22 witness this morning, we have, I am afraid --
23 LORD SAVILLE: In that case we could stop now
24 and see what the position is in an hour's time and if
25 anybody has turned up in an hour, we can start again at
1 20 to 1 or quarter to 1. the long and short of it is
2 we will start again when we have a witness to start
3 with.
4 (11.40 am)
5 (The luncheon adjournment)
6 (12.58 pm)
7 MS ANNE HARKIN (affirmed)
8 Questioned by MR CLARKE
9 LORD SAVILLE: Ms Harkin, if you look to your
10 right, you will see it is me talking to you, that is
11 the Chairman of the Tribunal. You probably know this,
12 but the questions will come from counsel who sit in
13 front of me and the important thing for you to try and
14 remember, if you would, is to keep your mouth fairly
15 close to the microphone so that everybody can hear what
16 you say. Yes, Mr Clarke.
17 MR CLARKE: We have your statement in your
18 maiden name, Anne Harkin, but you are now, I believe,
19 Mrs McGuinness, is that right?
20 A. That is correct.
21 Q. Is that statement which you signed on
22 21st June last year correct to the best of your
23 knowledge and belief?
24 A. To the best of my knowledge, although there
25 is some of the terminology in the statement which would
1 not be mine.
2 Q. Leaving aside the precise phrasings, is the
3 content true, to the best of your knowledge?
4 A. Yes.
5 Q. You describe being near the front of the
6 march and in paragraph 6 at AH10.1, perhaps we might
7 have it on the screen, you describe arriving at the
8 top, that is to say the west end of William Street,
9 walking east down William Street on the right side of
10 the road on the outside of the marchers. You say:
11 "At the time I presumed that the march was
12 making its way to the Guildhall. However, as we were
13 moving east down William Street there were rumblings in
14 the crowd that an army barricade had been set up
15 further east down William Street to prevent the march
16 from proceeding to the Guildhall."
17 Do I understand from that that when you set
18 off from Bishop's Field you regarded it as a march to
19 the Guildhall?
20 A. That is my recollection, yes.
21 Q. It was not until you heard these rumblings
22 that any question arose of the march turning off before
23 it reach the Guildhall?
24 A. That is correct.
25 Q. At the top of paragraph 7 on the next page
1 you describe seeing the lorry at the front of the march
2 turn right and head south down Rossville Street. Then
3 you say this:
4 "Despite this many people at the front of the
5 march, the brave sector of the crowd, were carrying on
6 east down William Street towards the Guildhall."
7 Why do you describe them as "the brave sector
8 of the crowd"?
9 A. That is part of the document that is not my
10 terminology.
11 Q. That is presumably somebody from Eversheds's
12 terminology?
13 A. I presume so, because it is not the language
14 I would use.
15 Q. Did you mean something to that effect when
16 your statement was taken down?
17 A. I think what I was trying to explain was that
18 we were heading towards what I presume was a march to
19 the Guildhall and that a front section of the crowd
20 decided to carry on down towards the barricade.
21 Q. Was there anything to stop them carrying on
22 towards the barricade?
23 A. No, not at that stage.
24 Q. Then you were one of those who continued
25 walking east towards the barricade, as you say in
1 paragraph 8, although your mother went on to Free Derry
2 Corner?
3 A. That is correct.
4 Q. Why did you decide to walk towards the
5 barricade at the end of William Street?
6 A. I think as I said in my statement it was not
7 something I actually thought out and did not
8 consciously decide to do it, just continued on down to
9 actually see what the blockage was.
10 Q. If we could have paragraphs 10 and 11 of your
11 statement highlighted, please. You describe getting to
12 barrier 14 and the crowd as being:
13 "... orderly and fairly quiet but people
14 were calling the soldiers all the names under the sun
15 and the soldiers responded in similar terms. People
16 were generally challenging the soldiers to let the
17 march through to the Guildhall."
18 Do you recall something that looked like
19 a deputation going up to speak to whoever was in charge
20 of the barrier?
21 A. No, not clearly. What I can recall is being
22 near the front of the march and being stopped at
23 a barbed wire barricade and I suppose verbal
24 confrontation between the marchers and the soldiers.
25 Q. You say that you cannot recall there being
1 any stone throwing by the crowd at the soldiers, you
2 cannot recall any stones being thrown over your head
3 and the next thing you recall is the water cannon
4 coming west right up to the barricade and spraying
5 a very powerful jet of water.
6 We have seen a number of pictures of that,
7 both still pictures and pictures of the newsreel. It
8 seems pretty clear from those that there was
9 a substantial amount of throwing of stones and bottles
10 and heaven knows what else before the water cannon came
11 up; do you have no recollection of that now?
12 A. No, and I have seen the footage and I have
13 seen many photographs of that particular incident.
14 What I am saying in my statement is that when I was
15 asked could I recall it and I was asked to be factual
16 about it, then from my memory I cannot recall it, but
17 I am not saying -- I have never said that it did not
18 happen, because it is obvious from footage that it
19 actually did.
20 Q. Thank you very much, that is very clear and
21 helpful. Then you then went back west, William Street
22 to Aggro Corner and then eventually you got, if we
23 could have a look at your map, which is at AH10.9, to
24 the point, if we could highlight the relevant area,
25 that is marked 1 on the attached map. That is about
1 five or six houses or buildings to the west of the
2 junction on the south side of William Street, do you
3 remember that?
4 A. Uh-huh.
5 Q. You describe in your statement seeing
6 soldiers on the GPO sorting office roof, five or six of
7 whom went across the roof in the direction that has
8 been put on the arrow, and you then describe seeing
9 soldiers in the old Richie's factory buildings which
10 are what you have circled; is that right, a little
11 further to the west?
12 A. Yes.
13 Q. That is what you are calling the old Richie's
14 factory buildings.
15 If we could have a look at your statement at
16 this moment, paragraphs 17 and 18 on AH10.3, you say
17 there that you noticed soldiers:
18 "... moving about northwest of where I was
19 standing in the old Richie's factory buildings ... I do
20 not know if they were the same group as I had earlier
21 seen crossing the roof of the GPO building. The
22 soldiers in Richie's factory had rifles and were taking
23 aim on the window ledges, pointing their rifles at an
24 angle in an easterly direction down William Street.
25 I cannot now recall at which windows I saw the
1 soldiers, nor how many soldiers I saw.
2 "I think that the windows were those facing
3 south out on to William Street and not those facing
4 east on to the wasteground to the south of the
5 Presbyterian Church and the GPO buildings."
6 Could we have a look on the screen at
7 P210.1? This is a picture, if we can orientate
8 ourselves, do you see the Presbyterian Church to the
9 north and the wasteground in front of it?
10 A. No.
11 Q. Let us see if I can maximize it. Can I have
12 control of this. I am just about to point out William
13 Street, and the Presbyterian Church and the GPO sorting
14 office and the wasteland in front of the church?
15 A. (Witness nodding).
16 Q. The building that you have identified on your
17 map is the complex that I am circling in red; do you
18 follow?
19 A. Uh-huh.
20 Q. And I want to make sure that your
21 recollection is as you have described in your
22 statement: you think that the soldiers that you saw in
23 the window were in the south-facing windows, which
24 would be windows in that face there; that is your
25 recollection, is it?
1 A. I am not exactly clear on it, I am sorry.
2 MR CLARKE: Let me show you another
3 photograph --
4 LORD SAVILLE: South-facing would be windows
5 facing on to William Street, would they not?
6 MR CLARKE: Yes.
7 LORD SAVILLE: Was it your recollection it
8 was windows facing on to William Street? If you cannot
9 remember, do tell us.
10 A. I am not very clear on it at this stage, no.
11 MR CLARKE: If we could go back to AH10.3,
12 and if we could maximize 18 and 19, you say in
13 paragraph 18:
14 "No stones were being thrown at the soldiers
15 I was looking at, even though they were easily
16 visible. There was no rioting at this point."
17 Had you seen some rioting when you were at
18 the point you describe, point 1 on your map?
19 A. Very honestly, I do not recall.
20 Q. Then what you do recall in paragraph 19 is
21 "hearing either a shot or shots" which you knew to be
22 a live round and although you do not know whether or
23 not the shot came from the rifle of one of the soldiers
24 in Richie's factory or elsewhere, you presumed it had
25 come from that factory because you had seen a rifle on
1 a window-ledge being aimed out on to William Street and
2 then heard the shot; that is right, is it?
3 A. That is correct.
4 Q. Then you say, paragraph 20, if we could have
5 a look at that:
6 "I recall seeing a person or person on the
7 ground somewhere around me, although" see the top of
8 the next page:
9 "I cannot now remember clearly whether or not
10 that person or those persons had been hit. I then
11 heard a second shot. There was not a big gap between
12 the first and second shots", and for a minute you
13 froze.
14 Could I ask you to look at the statement that
15 you made at the time? It is attached to your Eversheds
16 statement. Could we have AH10.8 on the screen and
17 could we highlight the text? Do you recall making this
18 statement?
19 A. Very vaguely.
20 Q. Do you know where you made it?
21 A. No, I do not remember. No, I do not recall.
22 Q. Do you know how you came to make it; did
23 somebody ask you, or what?
24 A. No, I think from memory at the time, people
25 were asked to go along and give their account of what
1 they had seen had happened on the day. I do not recall
2 where it happened. I remember the person that I made
3 the statement to. She was a schoolteacher.
4 Q. Is that the person who appears as a witness,
5 Hilda McCafferty?
6 A. Yes.
7 Q. If we look at it four lines down from the
8 top, what you said there was this:
9 "... we walked up William Street as far as
10 where Richie's factory was. We stood talking there and
11 we moved on to the footpath opposite Richie's. I then
12 walked further down William Street still opposite the
13 bottom end of Richie's. We saw the soldiers come
14 across the flat roofs behind Richie's and they climbed
15 over on to the derelict house at the top end of
16 Richie's and dropped down to the ground floor. There
17 were six to seven."
18 So you gave a description of soldiers coming
19 across flat roofs behind Richie's and climbing over
20 into a derelict house at the top end and dropping down
21 to the ground floor. Could we look at P201? This is
22 another photograph of the area. Do you see the
23 building with the nine windows just above William
24 Street?
25 A. Yes.
1 Q. That is the east-facing wall of the building
2 that you circled. Are you able to say by looking at
3 this photograph which was the flat roof behind Richie's
4 that the soldiers climbed over to get into a derelict
5 house?
6 A. No, not from this photograph, no, sorry. No.
7 Q. That picture does not bring back any memories
8 for you?
9 A. No, it does not, no.
10 Q. If we go back to AH10.8, and the body of your
11 statement, after the reference to there being six or
12 seven soldiers, you say this:
13 "A few boys started to throw stones at the
14 soldiers and the crowd still stood there."
15 It is pretty clear that you must have
16 recollected boys throwing stones at the soldiers at the
17 time when you made this statement?
18 A. Yes, and the statement was made maybe one
19 week after the incident and the current statement is
20 something like 20-odd years later.
21 Q. Of course, and I am sure you think that the
22 contents of this statement were the best that you could
23 recall very soon after the events took place. You say:
24 "No gas or rubber bullets were fired from the
25 building. The soldiers levelled their guns leaning on
1 the window-ledges and there was a shot fired. I am
2 nearly sure it was from one of the windows towards the
3 open space where Duffy's bookies was. The boys stopped
4 throwing stones. We moved back and we saw a man
5 falling on the footpath behind the open space and he
6 was brought towards the maisonettes. The crowd moved
7 back in that direction. Another shot was fired and
8 someone else fell. The crowd was around these two who
9 they were taking away."
10 We can see, can we not, that you recollected
11 two shots being fired and two people falling just as
12 you do now; is that right?
13 A. That is correct.
14 Q. The detail that you recalled in 1972 was that
15 the shot was fired from one of the windows towards the
16 open space where Duffy's bookies was. If we could have
17 P201 back on the screen, are you able to recall now
18 where Duffy's bookies had been?
19 A. No, I cannot recall, not from the photograph,
20 no.
21 (1.15 pm)
22 Q. If we could go back to your AH10.4, your
23 statement to Eversheds, at paragraph 22 you describe
24 running with the crowd on to Rossville Street and you
25 think that the route that you took is that which you
1 have described on your map, if we may see that at
2 AH10.9. That is your best recollection as I understand
3 it of the route you took from where you were in William
4 Street?
5 A. That is right.
6 Q. You describe becoming aware of the roar of
7 Saracens coming from behind you at some time before you
8 reached the rubble barricade and also the sound of
9 shooting of live rounds. Do you recall hearing, as you
10 ran towards the rubble barricade, as well as live
11 rounds, the shooting of rubber bullets?
12 A. No, not from memory, no.
13 Q. If you go back to your statement at paragraph
14 24, AH10.4, you describe there becoming aware of the
15 roar of Saracens and also the sound of shooting of live
16 rounds. You assumed that the Saracens were those that
17 you had seen east of barrier 14 and that they were
18 coming via William Street.
19 Do I take it from that that you did not see
20 them before they got into Rossville Street?
21 A. No, I do not think so, no.
22 Q. Then the next sentence but one you say:
23 "I noticed Saracens in the Eden Place area,
24 although I am not sure if this was when I was running
25 past or later. I also remember rubber bullets being
1 fired from there."
2 That is presumably from the Eden Place area,
3 is it?
4 A. Uh-huh, that is right.
5 Q. So you obviously remembered rubber bullets
6 being fired at some stage?
7 A. Mmm, that is correct.
8 Q. Is what you are seeking to say, that the
9 first thing that you heard was live rounds and you
10 later heard rubber bullets, or something else?
11 A. Well, it is very hard to recall all the
12 detail because so much was happening, but what I have
13 tried to do is give you an account of my memory of it
14 and I suppose the outstanding thing in my memory is
15 hearing live rounds and I know that there were rubber
16 bullets fired, but the timing of those I cannot recall.
17 Q. I quite understand. Thank you very much.
18 Could we then come to paragraph 27 at the
19 bottom of 10.4. You say this:
20 "By the time I reached the rubble barricade
21 I was on the east side of the street, next to the
22 western wall of block 1. I clambered over the rubble
23 barricade, which was a few feet high, and as I did so,
24 I grabbed someone's hand and pulled them over the
25 barricade. To this day I do not know who this was."
1 Is that so as we speak?
2 A. It is, yes.
3 Q. "Once on the south side of the rubble
4 barricade, still holding on to the stranger's hand,
5 I ran for my life west towards the entrance ..."
6 Next page, please:
7 "... to the car park of Glenfada Park
8 North."
9 Then you describe what happens as you ran
10 from east to west towards Glenfada Park North.
11 I wonder if you could help us on this: do you
12 have any recollection of the sort of numbers of people
13 that there were around at the rubble barricade when you
14 got close to it?
15 A. No, I just remember a lot of people being
16 about there. Numbers-wise I could not recall. I think
17 that it was a very scary time and I just do not recall
18 the detail of it.
19 Q. Could we have a look at photograph EP27.6? A
20 number of photographs have been taken which the Inquiry
21 has been provided with, from the south side of the
22 barricade, that is to say the opposite side of the
23 barricade from where you were when you ran towards it
24 and they show a group of people -- this is an example
25 -- facing the army vehicles to the north and standing
1 or moving around in the way in which we can see in the
2 photograph. Do you have any recollection of seeing
3 a scene like that when you came towards the barricade?
4 A. No, I do not have a clear recollection of it,
5 no.
6 Q. Do you have any clear recollection of what
7 happened as you got to the barricade, apart from the
8 fact that you took somebody's hand?
9 A. All I remember is that there were more people
10 than myself who were actually trying to climb over the
11 barricade and to move themselves up Rossville Street.
12 Q. If we go back to your statement at AH10.5,
13 paragraph 28, you describe running from east to west
14 towards Glenfada Park North. That would be effectively
15 across the whole length of the barricade; is that
16 right?
17 A. I crossed the barricade at a certain point
18 and I then continued to cross the road towards where
19 I thought was a corner and safety.
20 Q. You have a recollection of seeing a young man
21 with dark hair and wearing a light coloured top lying
22 on his side immediately to the south of the barricade,
23 but you do not know whether he was shot or whether he
24 had just tripped.
25 Can I ask we have a look at photograph
1 EP32.2? This is a photograph that was taken by
2 somebody very close to the barricade. You can see the
3 barbed wire and the wooden crosses which formed part of
4 it. In the immediate foreground there is a picture of
5 a young man lying with his face up on the ground in
6 front of the man with an anorak who is in the
7 foreground of the picture. Does that picture bring
8 back any memories for you?
9 A. No. The only recollection I have of the
10 person who was lying on the ground is that they had
11 shoulder-length dark hair and that is the only very
12 clear memory that I do have. The face does not mean
13 anything to me here; I do not think I was there long
14 enough to actually recall who it may have been.
15 Q. Then you made it to the southern gable end of
16 Glenfada Park North, as we see if we go back to your
17 map at AH10.9, to the spot you have marked at "2" just
18 inside Glenfada Park North; is that right?
19 A. That is correct.
20 Q. You crouched down by the side of a fence; is
21 that where the figure "2" is on the east side of
22 Glenfada Park North?
23 A. It was in and around the vicinity of that.
24 I know that we just came round the corner and tried to
25 hide behind the fencing. The exact spot is very hard
1 to recall.
2 Q. What you do recall is, as I understand it,
3 seeing people run into the car park from
4 Rossville Street?
5 A. Yes.
6 Q. Trying to find cover, as you had, behind the
7 wooden fencing at the back of the flats?
8 A. That is correct.
9 Q. With others milling around in a daze. If we
10 go back to paragraph 31 at AH10.5, you describe:
11 "A young man running west into the car park
12 through the entrance at the southeast corner of the car
13 park along the route shown by the arrow, with his face
14 covered in blood." You say:
15 "I do not know where he went after he came
16 into the car park."
17 Is your recollection simply that you saw
18 a man with blood on his face and then he passed you and
19 went out?
20 A. My memory of it is that, that while I was at
21 the back of the car park that -- I do not know whether
22 I was moving forward or he came towards me, but that
23 the memory of seeing a young man, again with dark hair
24 with, at the time I presume was a bullet wound which
25 was at the side of his nose and at the centre of his
1 cheek and a lot of blood on his face. That is as much
2 memory as I have of that particular incident, but it is
3 probably one of the very clearest ones from that time
4 that I do have.
5 Q. Whilst you were in the car park do you have
6 any recollection of soldiers coming into the car park?
7 A. No, and I do not think I stayed about the car
8 park that long.
9 Q. Do you have any recollection of hearing shots
10 in the car park?
11 A. I think that there was, there was shooting
12 while I was in the car park, but ...
13 Q. Did that shooting appear to be actually in
14 the car park or simply shots that whilst you were in
15 the car park you heard coming from elsewhere?
16 A. I think it was shots that I heard coming from
17 elsewhere.
18 Q. Do you have any recollection of the body of
19 somebody either killed or wounded being brought into
20 the car park?
21 A. No, and as I say, I stayed in the car park
22 from memory a short period of time. I suppose my own
23 sense of maybe survival or whatever was to try and get
24 to somewhere that I thought was safer, so I do not
25 recall that happening.
1 Q. As you say, you made your way to Westland
2 Street by the route that you have described in your
3 map.
4 A. (Witness nodding).
5 Q. Could I ask for paragraph 32 to be
6 highlighted. You describe making your way to Westland
7 Street and, in the last sentence of this paragraph, you
8 say:
9 "Somewhere in a house in Glenfada Park there
10 were a group of people administering first aid to
11 someone, although I cannot now recall any more
12 detail."
13 How do you know that; did you see this
14 happening in a house in Glenfada Park or did somebody
15 tell you about it?
16 A. Well, I was not in a house, first of all,
17 I was in the back part of the car park.
18 Q. Yes.
19 A. I remember people, you know, around the back
20 of the house and I vaguely remember seeing that
21 somebody was hurt. That is all the detail I have
22 and ...
23 Q. May we take it from that that you have
24 a vague recollection of seeing someone close to a house
25 in Glenfada Park, having first aid administered to him,
1 not actually inside a house?
2 A. Again, I cannot recall all the detail, sorry.
3 Q. I quite follow that. As you said a moment
4 ago, you never went into a house?
5 A. That is correct.
6 Q. You have never actually seen somebody inside
7 a house having first aid administered to him?
8 A. That is correct.
9 Q. Would we be right to assume that such
10 recollection as you have is of something happening in
11 the outside?
12 A. Or it is something that somebody has said and
13 I have a vague recollection of it.
14 Q. You describe in paragraph 33 hanging around
15 shocked in Westland Street where there were lots of
16 people drifting about the place. Can you recall how
17 long you spent in Westland Street?
18 A. No, I cannot recall at all.
19 Q. There has been evidence from some witnesses
20 of one or more cars racing down Westland Street and
21 people coming out of them and taking weapons out of the
22 cars; did you see anything of that kind?
23 A. No, I did not, no.
24 Q. Could I come, lastly, to paragraph 40 of your
25 statement, which is at AH10.6. You describe the fact
1 that your mother, who has since passed away, was at the
2 head of the march and at Free Derry Corner and that she
3 said that there was shooting coming from the walls:
4 "At some point that day, she listened to the
5 army communications on the shortwave radio. She formed
6 the impression that there was a game plan for that day
7 and the actions of the British Army were deliberate."
8 Is this something that she told you, that she
9 had formed that impression?
10 A. Yes, that was her view.
11 Q. When did she tell you that she had formed
12 that view?
13 A. I am presuming it was in and around the time
14 of the actual happenings of Bloody Sunday.
15 Q. Do you know when she could have been
16 listening to these army communications?
17 A. No, I do not know.
18 Q. Is it before she went on the march?
19 A. I could not honestly tell you, no.
20 Q. Did you have a shortwave radio at home?
21 A. That is something else I could not tell you.
22 Q. We have her statement. If we could have it
23 at AH10.11, could we have that on the screen?
24 (1.30 pm)
25 Am I right in thinking the statement we are
1 looking at is the statement of your mother?
2 A. Uh-huh, that is correct.
3 Q. She describes there being at Free Derry
4 Corner and Bernadette Devlin talking about there being
5 15 of us to one of them, or words to that effect, and
6 her later running towards the Lecky Road. There does
7 not seem to be anything in that about army
8 communications.
9 You do not know of any other statement other
10 than this of your mother's, do you?
11 A. No, I do not.
12 Q. If we go to AH10.8, this is going back to
13 your statement, in the last three lines, you said this
14 at the time:
15 "We walked over to the Old Bog and stood
16 there. There was shooting from the wall, I am sure it
17 was from the walls. We ran up the Bog Road and that is
18 all I say."
19 Do you have any recollection now of seeing
20 shooting from the city walls?
21 A. No, I am -- not now, or I would have entered
22 it into my other statement.
23 Q. We see in this statement that you said that
24 there was shooting from the walls "I am sure it was
25 from the walls". We cannot tell from that, can we,
1 whether that was because that was where the sound
2 appeared to come from, or for any other reason?
3 A. I suppose it is hard to tell and, again, you
4 know, the statement was given probably several days
5 after the Bloody Sunday event, so ...
6 Q. If we look at your present statement at
7 AH10.6, paragraph 39, you refer to the fact that you
8 made this comment about shooting from the city walls,
9 but you add this, you say:
10 "As we ran up Rossville Street, we noticed
11 that shooting was coming from there."
12 Your previous statement refers to shooting
13 coming from the Old Bog Road. Are you saying it is
14 your present recollection that you noticed shooting
15 whilst you ran up Rossville Street?
16 A. My present recollection is that -- I have
17 a view that there was shooting coming from the city
18 walls and I am just not absolutely sure if I saw it or
19 heard it when I was in Rossville Street or at the
20 corner of Rossville Street on to the Bog Road.
21 Q. Is your recollection, such as it is now, of
22 hearing shooting from that direction or seeing shooting
23 from that direction?
24 A. I think my recollection is hearing shooting
25 coming from that direction.
1 MR CLARKE: Thank you, those are all my
2 questions. There may be some others.
3 Questioned by MR ARTHUR HARVEY
4 MR HARVEY: Mrs McGuinness, my name is Arthur
5 Harvey and I appear on behalf of a number of the
6 families of deceased and injured.
7 I wonder, could you look at the original
8 statement that you made on -- the date of occurrence is
9 30th January, but some time it would appear in around
10 January or February 1972, at AH10.8. Could we just
11 highlight the top half of that statement? If I could
12 take you halfway down that particular statement:
13 "I then walked further down William Street,
14 still opposite the bottom end of Richie's. We saw the
15 soldiers come across the flat roofs behind Richie's.
16 They climbed over on to the derelict house at the top
17 end of Richie's and dropped down to the ground floor.
18 There were six or seven. A few boys started to throw
19 stones at the soldiers and the crowd still stood
20 there."
21 If you could just look at photograph 201.
22 Again, could we enlarge the area around Abbey Taxis?
23 The building that you are referring to seeing the
24 soldiers come through and drop down to the ground
25 floor; can you identify it on that photograph?
1 A. I find it very hard to recall.
2 Q. If I perhaps seek to assist you in this
3 limited extent. William Street is the street with the
4 motor vehicles that can be seen running north to south
5 on the photograph.
6 A. Right.
7 Q. Sorry, it is east to west, but on the
8 photograph it is top to bottom, do you see that?
9 A. Yes.
10 Q. Richie's factory is the wasteground here?
11 A. Uh-huh.
12 Q. The Nook Bar is there. Abbey Taxis is here
13 and, as I have indicated, the wasteground is the yellow
14 arrow to the right of the photograph; does that help
15 you?
16 A. What I am trying to do is recall the actual
17 spot where I was standing, which would have been down
18 below the open space on the left-hand side of my
19 screen.
20 Q. The arrow which is -- the yellow arrow going
21 to The Nook Bar -- can you recall The Nook Bar?
22 A. No, I do not, funnily enough.
23 Q. Do you recall Castle Laundry?
24 A. No.
25 Q. If you look at the wasteground that you are
1 referring to, is that this wasteground?
2 A. Yes, uh-huh.
3 Q. If Duffy's Bookmakers shop used to be between
4 The Nook Bar and Castle Laundry, does that assist you;
5 if it does not, just say so?
6 A. It does not jog my memory, I am very sorry.
7 Q. The two persons who were struck by bullets
8 that day in and around the position in William Street
9 around Richie's factory, did you learn who those two
10 persons were?
11 A. I have to say only in very recent times.
12 Q. Your statement in fact that is dated --
13 letter AH10.8, if we could return to that, if you could
14 just highlight the top portion of it again. Do you see
15 to the top right-hand corner of the statement, it
16 actually says "Donaghy and Johnson". Again it is very
17 difficult looking back after some 28 years, but does it
18 appear that when you were making your statement, the
19 persons that you refer to in paragraph 20 of your
20 current statement actually does refer to Donaghy and
21 Johnson?
22 A. At the time I do not think that I was
23 actually, you know, 100 per cent sure who the people
24 were.
25 LORD SAVILLE: I am not quite sure of the
1 point of those questions, Mr Harvey. One can see on
2 a lot of these statements names have been put by
3 somebody. Sometimes you will find them with question
4 marks on them. I had assumed, perhaps wrongly, that
5 that was really somebody trying to classify these
6 things at some stage, rather than, unless the statement
7 demonstrates otherwise, rather than necessarily the
8 witness's recollection.
9 MR HARVEY: Not only do I accept that as
10 being the case, it is one of the reasons why I am
11 asking the questions of this witness.
12 LORD SAVILLE: As I say, I have assumed
13 that. It may be challenged, but that is what on the
14 face of it seemed to be the position. If anybody wants
15 to challenge it, no doubt they will in due course.
16 MR HARVEY: The other matter I would like you
17 to deal with is in fact your knowledge of Glenfada Park
18 at that time. In 1972 would you have been familiar
19 with Columbcille Court, Glenfada Park and Abbey Park?
20 A. No, not very familiar at all.
21 Q. Therefore if I can refer you back to AH10.5,
22 paragraph 30, if that could be highlighted for the
23 moment. You have indicated:
24 "While I was crouched down by the fence I saw
25 people running west into the car park of Glenfada Park
1 North from Rossville Street through the entrance in the
2 car park in the southeast corner of Glenfada Park
3 North."
4 Could you in fact have been in Abbey Park
5 rather than Glenfada Park North?
6 A. It is quite possible because, as I was saying
7 to you, I do not know the -- or I did not know the
8 geography of the Bogside and the housing developments
9 there very well.
10 Q. If again we could put up AH10.9 and highlight
11 the area around Glenfada Park North and south, the
12 route that you have given for getting to Glenfada Park
13 North is: you have proceeded from north to south along
14 Rossville Street going to the east of the rubble
15 barricade, then cutting through Glenfada Park North
16 into Abbey Park. Did you know that that was Abbey Park
17 as one comes out? If I could have control and point --
18 did you know that that was Abbey Park?
19 A. No, not at that time, I would know it a lot
20 better now, but at that time, no.
21 Q. Where you have marked "2" as the position you
22 took shelter, could it have been that in fact you have
23 taken shelter in Abbey Park?
24 A. I suppose it is quite possible, because the
25 recollection of that day, a lot of it is fairly vague
1 and, as I said, the geography of the place, I would not
2 have been very sure of.
3 Q. Could it be -- we certainly know there was
4 a number of persons in both number 7 and 8 Abbey Park,
5 that is the house -- number 8 is the Carr's and number
6 8 is the O'Reilly's, and in those houses there was
7 a number of persons who were receiving first aid,
8 including Michael Kelly, Mr Wray and also William
9 McKinney.
10 When you refer, at paragraph 32, if we could
11 return to that at AH10.5, if you see the very last
12 sentence:
13 "Somewhere in a house in Glenfada Park, there
14 was a group of people administering first aid to
15 someone, although I cannot now recall any more
16 detail."
17 Again could that have been the houses in
18 Abbey Park to which I just referred?
19 A. It is quite possible.
20 MR HARVEY: I have no further questions.
21 Questioned by MR O'HANLON
22 MR O'HANLON: Ms Harkin, my name is Paddy
23 O'Hanlon. I represent the Northern Ireland Civil
24 Rights Association at the Tribunal.
25 Could I refer you first to AH10.6, paragraph
1 40. Could that be put up on the screen, please:
2 "Looking back at that day, I cannot
3 understand why, after so many peaceful marches, the
4 British Army attacked innocent marchers in this way."
5 You say that at the start of that particular
6 paragraph. Had you been on many civil rights marches?
7 A. I had been on several that occurred in Derry
8 itself.
9 Q. Could you indicate to the Tribunal when your
10 association with civil rights marches started? In
11 a general way, because it is a long time ago?
12 A. It is a long time ago. It would have been
13 after the Burntollet march where all the incidents
14 happened around that and I was actually working on that
15 day and it would have been after that, because I was
16 not part of that actual march.
17 Q. But you took part in several marches after
18 that?
19 A. I did, indeed, yes.
20 Q. Were they all peaceful?
21 A. Yes, they were.
22 (1.45 pm)
23 Q. Could I refer you to AH10.1, which is
24 paragraph 2 of your statement.
25 You indicate in that particular paragraph:
1 "From 1968/1969 onwards I took part in
2 several civil rights marches. The marchers were
3 calling for equal rights and better housing for
4 Catholics."
5 Your best recollection, what were conditions
6 in, for instance, the Creggan and the Bogside from the
7 point of view of civil rights like at that stage?
8 A. Well, I suppose the most outstanding thing is
9 the lack of proper housing and proper facilities for
10 people -- for the people who were living there.
11 I think the Bogside more so than Creggan because
12 Creggan had been a new estate that had been developed,
13 but again there was lack of amenities.
14 Q. What type of amenities are we talking about
15 here?
16 A. Well, we had houses, but we did not have the
17 other facilities that were required for a large
18 community such as recreational amenities, proper health
19 care, that sort of amenity, which a large housing
20 estate such as Creggan would have been entitled to.
21 Q. You also refer in this paragraph to the
22 policy of gerrymandering?
23 A. (Witness nodding).
24 Q. You were 22 at the time. What do you recall,
25 what were the things that struck you about that policy
1 and how it affected the local population?
2 A. My recollection of that is that I was born on
3 the Waterside area of Derry, which would be on the east
4 bank, and we lived there in a farmhouse that had been
5 my mother's family home and to get housed we had to
6 move to the Creggan Estate, because it was the only
7 development that there was and I remember discussions
8 in our home where my mother, who wanted to stay on the
9 Waterside, made the points that we were being moved to
10 the Creggan side in order not to affect the Council and
11 how it was made up.
12 Q. When you say "in order not to affect the
13 Council and how it was made up", are you talking about
14 the voting situation, or are you talking about any
15 other aspect?
16 A. No, it would have been the voting situation.
17 Q. How did that reflect itself locally?
18 A. Locally the Creggan was developed as a mainly
19 Catholic estate, although there were several, I think
20 at the very start numerous Protestant families who
21 lived in it.
22 LORD SAVILLE: I do not want to interrupt
23 your line of questioning, but we do have quite a lot of
24 evidence, some of it expert evidence, on what one might
25 describe as the political situation in the city at the
1 time. I am not sure this witness can really help us
2 very much, can she?
3 MR O'HANLON: Indeed, sir, I will not
4 continue this topic. My respectful submission would be
5 some first-hand evidence from an ordinary person might
6 have been helpful to the Tribunal.
7 LORD SAVILLE: I am not sure any of the
8 material we have gathered to date, which certainly is
9 fairly detailed, is the subject of challenge. As
10 I say, I do not want to stop you, but it is important,
11 so that we can get on -- you are well aware of the
12 hundreds of witnesses we have to listen to -- that we
13 confine ourselves to question that really have some
14 immediate relevance.
15 MR O'HANLON: I must certainly take note of
16 that, sir, and I will continue on.
17 Could I refer you then to AH10.1, paragraph
18 4? You indicate there the general atmosphere and the
19 composition of the march. How would you consider it in
20 terms of being representative of Derry society at the
21 time, the people who were on the march?
22 A. Well, I think that when I have pointed out
23 that there was women and children, you know, men, women
24 and children from every walk of life who were there,
25 then I think it was fairly representative of the Derry
1 community.
2 Q. You indicate that you were some 30 or 40 feet
3 from the front of the march?
4 A. That is correct.
5 Q. Were there many people between you and the
6 lorry?
7 A. Oh, God, it is very hard to remember, but
8 I know that from memory the roads were fairly packed.
9 Q. Were there many clergy on the march, or do
10 you recollect that?
11 A. I recall clergy being on the march, but
12 I could not tell you in numbers.
13 Q. When the lorry turned right to go down
14 towards Free Derry Corner, you stayed in the William
15 Street area; is that correct?
16 A. That is correct.
17 Q. Could I refer you to AH10.2, paragraph 9,
18 please? That particular paragraph indicates:
19 "When we got to the army barricade (which is
20 marked as 'barrier 14' on the attached map at grid
21 reference Q12) a crowd was building up on the west of
22 the barricade. We walked east towards the barricade
23 and were so close to it that we could touch it."
24 Is that exactly the situation as you could
25 recollect it?
1 A. It is, yes.
2 Q. You were within touching distance of the
3 barrier?
4 A. Uh-huh.
5 Q. "Immediately to the east of the barricade,
6 facing west from us, were a solid line across William
7 Street of about 10 or 15 soldiers."
8 They were standing on the other side of the
9 barricade, is that correct?
10 A. That is correct, yes, sir.
11 Q. Were they standing in a line, were they?
12 A. From my memory, yes.
13 Q. Would a small gap between them, as you
14 indicate in your statement?
15 A. Uh-huh, that is correct.
16 Q. When you were at that particular barricade at
17 that particular time, during the period you were there,
18 did you see a line of stewards at the barricade?
19 A. There were people in front of us trying to,
20 I suppose, maintain the crowd who wanted to stand along
21 the barricade.
22 Q. When you say "maintain the crowd", do you
23 recollect what they were doing?
24 A. From memory some of them had their back to
25 the barricade, trying to coax people to stay, to stay
1 calm and to move backwards.
2 Q. Were they having any success, in your
3 recollection? It is a long time ago.
4 A. I think that the people stayed there for
5 a certain period of time. As I say, the water cannon
6 came along and it helped to disperse the crowd.
7 LORD SAVILLE: Did they have any success with
8 you?
9 A. Sorry?
10 LORD SAVILLE: I said, did they have any
11 success with you?
12 A. In terms of moving back ways?
13 LORD SAVILLE: Yes?
14 A. We moved back within a very short period of
15 time and once the water cannon appeared, we moved back
16 a lot more quickly, I think.
17 LORD SAVILLE: I suppose that was because of
18 the water cannon, was it, rather than the stewards?
19 A. Yes, but what we were doing at the barricade
20 was registering a protest, because we wanted to
21 continue on with the march to the Guildhall. We were
22 not posing any threat to the people on the other side
23 of the barricade.
24 MR O'HANLON: Can you indicate to the
25 Tribunal your best recollection of the period of time
1 that you spent at the barricade?
2 A. Sorry, could you repeat the question?
3 Q. From the moment you arrived when you got
4 within what you describe as "touching distance of the
5 barricade"; from that time to when the water cannon
6 began to eject dye, have you any idea what period of
7 time had elapsed?
8 A. No, very hard to recall, sorry.
9 Q. You cannot help in any way in relation to
10 that, it could have been any length of time?
11 A. Well, it was not -- you know, it was not
12 a period of five or ten minutes from memory, it would
13 have been probably a very short period of time.
14 Q. Would you like to put a number on it, if it
15 was not five minutes?
16 A. I could not, I honestly could not.
17 MR O'HANLON: Was it under five minutes, in
18 your best recollection?
19 A. My best recollection is it was a short period
20 of time.
21 Questioned by MR GLASGOW
22 MR GLASGOW: Mrs McGuinness, would it be
23 right to say you remained at or close to the barricade
24 for something like a quarter of an hour?
25 A. No, I do not think so.
1 Q. I wonder would you like to look at paragraph
2 14 of your statement on AH10.3, either on the screen
3 or, if you have it in front of you, paragraph 14.
4 I think you give us your estimate, I stress the word,
5 of 15 to 20 minutes between the time what you left what
6 we have been calling Aggro Corner and the time you got
7 back there; does that help you?
8 A. It could be the period of time that it took
9 to walk from William Street to the barricade and about
10 there and come back again, but it -- my recollection is
11 that I would not have been in front of the barricade
12 for 15 or 20 minutes.
13 Q. It is not great distance, is it, but were
14 there a lot of people there?
15 A. There would have been a lot of people milling
16 about and a lot of people at the march, yes.
17 Q. Do you recall it taking you some time to work
18 your way to the front of the crowd and then some time
19 to work your way back?
20 A. No, I do not recall.
21 Q. You do not?
22 A. No.
23 Q. It would appear from what you are saying in
24 your statement that you made your way fairly easily to
25 the front of the crowd to within touching distance of
1 the barricade, is that right?
2 A. I think from the original part of my
3 statement I was fairly near the front of the crowd
4 anyway, when we originally started to march, and
5 continued on down William Street. I do not recall the
6 length of time I stood in front of barricade --
7 Q. If it was between 15 and 20 minutes passing
8 between the time you left that junction to the time you
9 got back to it, what do you think you were doing if you
10 were not standing close to or in the area of the
11 barricade?
12 A. Well, I could have been standing about
13 watching what was happening; I could have been
14 observing what was happening at the barricade once
15 I left.
16 Q. You stood for some time at the barricade or
17 close to the barricade observing what was happening,
18 did you?
19 A. I quite possibly could have, yes, but my
20 memory of it is that I did not spend an awful long time
21 in front of the barricade.
22 Q. For the time you were close to the barricade
23 and observing what was happening, your evidence to this
24 Tribunal is: that the crowd was "orderly and fairly
25 quiet", is it, those are the words that you would use?
1 A. Sorry, which period of time are you talking
2 about?
3 Q. The time when you were standing close to the
4 barricade, for however long it was. Your evidence on
5 oath to this Tribunal is that "the crowd was orderly
6 and fairly quiet", those are the words you wish to use
7 in your evidence?
8 A. The crowd was orderly. There was banter
9 between the people who were protesting on one side of
10 the barricade and the soldiers on the other side. It
11 was not anything extraordinary in terms of, in my view,
12 being out of hand.
13 Q. Whether or not it was out of the ordinary,
14 did you see missiles of any kind being thrown?
15 A. As I have said in my statement, I do not
16 recall missiles being thrown while I was at the
17 barricade and, as I said previously, that is not to say
18 that it did not actually happen, because I have seen
19 footage of the actual events of that time. My
20 recollection of it is, because that is what I was asked
21 to put into a statement, was that I do not recall it
22 actually happening.
23 Q. You have made two statements. If you would
24 like to go -- two sentences, if you would like to go to
25 your paragraph 10 at AH10.2, your first sentence is:
1 "The crowd was orderly and fairly quiet but
2 people were calling the soldiers all the names under
3 the sun and the soldiers responded in similar terms."
4 Is that true?
5 A. Yes.
6 Q. I do not want there to be any
7 misunderstanding, I am putting to you that you know
8 perfectly well that is a seriously misleading statement
9 and you cannot ever have believed that was a true
10 representation of what you saw?
11 A. Sorry, what I have given you in my statement
12 is my memory of what happened and my view at that time.
13 Q. Your view then would be that at the time you
14 saw the water cannon used there would have been no
15 justification for it whatsoever; is that right?
16 A. I do not see that in my statement anywhere.
17 Q. Paragraph 11, the next sentence down, says:
18 "The next thing I recall is the water cannon
19 just coming right up to the barricade and spraying
20 a very powerful jet of water."
21 Your evidence today to this Tribunal would be
22 that there was no justification for that whatsoever, is
23 that right?
24 A. My view is that the people who were at the
25 barricade were there to register a protest, that there
1 was banter going on, that I did not see any missiles
2 being thrown, so I could not see any justification for
3 a water cannon being fired at me or somebody like me,
4 who wanted to register a protest.
5 Q. Did you see the water cannon withdraw after
6 it first approached the barricade?
7 A. Not that I recall, no.
8 Q. You do not recall there being two periods
9 during which the water cannon was used?
10 A. No.
11 Q. You did not see it go backwards after it
12 became engulfed in CS gas?
13 A. Not that I recall, no.
14 Q. Can you think about that? Do you not
15 remember seeing the water cannon backing away after it
16 was first deployed; did you not see that?
17 A. No.
18 Q. Are the words that we have just looked at in
19 paragraph 10 and 11 your own words, or are they what
20 somebody has written down as a result of a conversation
21 with you? Can you help us as to how this statement was
22 taken? Did you dictate it?
23 A. Can you bring up 10 and 11 again, please?
24 Q. Paragraph 10 is the one you have there. The
25 difference that I drew your attention to is between
1 "the crowd was orderly" and the last sentence "I
2 cannot recall there being any stone throwing". Are
3 they your own words? Did you dictate them to somebody
4 who wrote them down?
5 A. (Pause).
6 (2.00 pm)
7 They are what I recall, yes.
8 Q. They are what you recall. How were they
9 written down, Mrs McGuinness? Did somebody ask you
10 questions and write down the answers, or was there
11 a conversation following which somebody wrote down the
12 gist of what you had said, or would you express it in
13 some other way?
14 A. They were, I suppose, part of a question
15 conversation and me trying to recall what had actually
16 happened on the day and notes were taken from that.
17 Q. Go to the top of the page, if you would be so
18 kind, paragraph 7. We have looked at the last but one
19 line before, where there was a reference to what was
20 described as "the brave sector of the crowd". How do
21 those words appear there if they are not yours?
22 I think you have told us already they are not.
23 A. Because I think when somebody speaks or
24 somebody writes that you know what the terminology one
25 would use oneself, right. I would not use that type of
1 terminology. I should have detected it when I first
2 read the statement when I received it. I did not, and
3 the other part of the statement which is not my
4 terminology is the reference to "Aggro Corner", because
5 I live in this town and have lived in it for numerous
6 years and I have never referred to William
7 Street/Rossville Street as Aggro Corner.
8 Q. To help you with that, is it the point at the
9 bottom of the page at paragraph 12 you are thinking
10 about, the last but two sentences reads:
11 "This spot was always a trouble spot and was
12 known locally as 'Aggro Corner'", in inverted commas?
13 A. Yes.
14 Q. Your evidence is you would not have used
15 those words?
16 A. That is correct.
17 Q. Is it possible, to be fair to the people who
18 took the statement, they might have said to you "is
19 that the place that is spoken of as Aggro Corner", do
20 you remember anything like that?
21 A. It quite possibly be, because it is the only
22 way I can see that it would be in my statement.
23 Q. I fully appreciate you do not want to use the
24 expression yourself, but if someone had said to you,
25 "is that the place people talk about as Aggro Corner",
1 you would have known what they meant by it?
2 A. Yes, you would have understood what they
3 meant by it, but, you know, my view on it was that they
4 were using it as a reference that they would
5 understand.
6 Q. Not to mince words, if I may, Mrs McGuinness,
7 it is an area where you knew there was regular routine
8 rioting?
9 A. I think it is an area that everybody knew
10 there was regular, routine rioting, yes.
11 Q. Could we go over the page to paragraph 17 of
12 your statement, please, on AH10.3? You have there
13 given the account of the soldiers who you saw moving
14 about and eventually finishing up in Richie's factory.
15 Can you now visualise that yourself, Mrs McGuinness?
16 Do you have a mental picture of it, or is it something
17 you recall writing about at the time?
18 A. It is something I recall from the time.
19 Q. Does it help if we look at the photograph
20 again? It is photograph P201. Would you mind looking
21 at that and tell us whether you can -- P201? If we
22 leave it as full size. I think your suggestion is that
23 the soldiers would have come somewhere from the
24 right-hand of the photograph finishing up with the
25 building with the nine blank windows. Do you now have
1 any kind of a picture in your mind of soldiers moving
2 from right to left across that photograph?
3 A. No, what I recall is the soldiers on the top
4 of the sorting office roof and the soldiers at the
5 windows in the building. The other detail I cannot
6 recall.
7 Q. You do not actually recall seeing them go
8 from one place to the other, but you recall them at one
9 time being on the GPO roof and then at a later stage
10 being in some of those nine windows, is that correct?
11 A. Uh-huh.
12 Q. I do not disagree with you, you put two and
13 two together and assumed they must have made their way
14 from the right to the left of the photograph? Again
15 that is not a criticism, am I right in assuming that is
16 what you must have thought? You did not see them
17 moving across that ground, but assumed perfectly
18 reasonably they must have done?
19 A. Originally in my statement I said that I had
20 seen them going across a flat roof and ending up at the
21 windows. What I am saying to you is that that detail
22 I have not got a very clear actual recall of.
23 Q. I wholly accept that. Let me put it to you
24 bluntly, if in fact you are right and some of the
25 soldiers left the roof and ended up in the building
1 with the nine blank windows and they made their way, as
2 they may say, on the far side of the derelict wall we
3 can see on the photograph. You -- without any
4 criticism of you -- would not have been able to see
5 them make their way behind that wall, would you; do you
6 see what I am putting to you?
7 A. I do, yes. I am not quite clear as to
8 whether I would have seen them or not.
9 Q. Let us put it positively, then. If they made
10 their way across the wasteground between the
11 photographer and the wall, you see what I am referring
12 to, the wasteground between the GPO and that wall, you
13 would have clearly seen them walking across that ground
14 and climbing in through the windows, but you have no
15 recollection of seeing that?
16 A. No.
17 Q. If they did make their way behind the wall,
18 clambering over what was left of the ruined buildings
19 behind that, you would accept that as being perfectly
20 possibly what happened?
21 A. It is possible.
22 Q. At any event there came a time when you were
23 conscious of seeing soldiers at those nine windows or
24 some of them, is that correct?
25 A. That is correct.
1 Q. Did you keep your eye on them?
2 A. Well, that is another very hard question to
3 answer, given all that was happening at the time.
4 Q. Do the best you can.
5 A. Probably not constantly.
6 Q. Did you see any stones thrown at them or past
7 them, that you can now recall?
8 A. I cannot recall now, but I have to refer back
9 to my original statement where I said that there were
10 some stones thrown at the time.
11 Q. That is indeed, if it helps you to look at
12 it, it is AH10.8. You are absolutely right, that is
13 what you said:
14 "A few boys started to throw stones at the
15 soldiers and the crowd still stood there ..."
16 You say that is what you put at the time.
17 You do not have any recollection of that now
18 but you are accepting it may have been the case; is
19 that right?
20 A. I do not have a recollection now, but I am
21 accepting it may have been the case.
22 Q. Let me put another incident to you,
23 Mrs McGuinness, can you help the Tribunal as to this:
24 did you see a young man on the photograph come from --
25 did you see a young man creeping along the wall from
1 William Street towards those windows and then suddenly
2 throw something in at the soldiers through the open
3 windows, did you see anything like that at all?
4 A. No, I did not.
5 Q. You are sure?
6 A. Very sure.
7 Q. Do you now have any recollection or any
8 mental picture in your mind of seeing anything thrown
9 at or past those windows?
10 A. No, I do not.
11 Q. There was quite a lot of noise, was not
12 there?
13 A. I am presuming there was, it is very hard to
14 recall.
15 Q. Please do not agree with me if you do not
16 mean to, Mrs McGuinness?
17 A. Well, I do not recall the noise level
18 actually, I do not.
19 Q. Do you recall rubber bullets being fired even
20 when you were at that stage, specifically from any of
21 those windows?
22 A. No.
23 Q. You saw a young man in the -- if we still say
24 on the photograph, you see the wasteground to the left
25 of the little white car that is moving between the
1 shadows down William Street?
2 A. Uh-huh.
3 Q. Did you see anybody in that area?
4 A. What do you mean, did I see anybody in the
5 area?
6 Q. Did you see people in that area as you look
7 at that photograph, to the left of that little vehicle
8 whatever it is, a car or a van?
9 A. There was numerous people all along the
10 street, it is very hard to recall the actual spot where
11 people were standing.
12 Q. Do you remember where either of the people
13 who you saw either shot or who had been shot were in
14 relation to that photograph?
15 A. No, not at this stage.
16 Q. Not at this stage?
17 A. I cannot, no.
18 Q. It follows you did not see what either of
19 them were doing before they were shot?
20 A. That is correct, yes.
21 Q. On a different matter I now want to bring you
22 to Rossville Street when you were moving away from the
23 area we have just been talking about. Am I right in
24 saying there came a time when you heard, in your own
25 words "the roar of Saracen engines and shots"?
1 A. Uh-huh.
2 Q. At the same time?
3 A. I am not sure if it was at the same time.
4 Q. Again, if it helps you, please look at your
5 statement at AH10.4, paragraph 24. Could we enlarge
6 paragraph 24 for you on AH10.4, just below the middle
7 of paragraph 24 you say:
8 "When I first heard the roar of Saracen
9 engines and the shots"?
10 A. Uh-huh.
11 Q. I think it is plain from that that you were
12 saying you heard them at the same time?
13 A. That is right, yes.
14 Q. Am I right?
15 A. Yes, from the statement, yes.
16 Q. And the shots that you heard at the same time
17 as you were hearing the Saracens' engines roaring, did
18 you know where those shots had come from or did you
19 just hear shots?
20 A. I think that I just heard shots and the sound
21 of the Saracen. I cannot recall trying to figure out
22 where the shooting was coming from, sorry.
23 Q. It was not a criticism, but you do have
24 a recollection of hearing shooting at the same time as
25 you are hearing the roaring of Saracens' engines;
1 I want to be clear about that, I have got that right,
2 have I?
3 A. That is my recollection.
4 Q. Could I ask you one question, if I may,
5 Mrs McGuinness, about the area that my learned friend
6 Mr Arthur Harvey asked you about, which is your
7 paragraph 29 on page AH10.5? You remember that
8 Mr Harvey asked you whether or not you might be
9 mistaken. Again I am sure as uncritically as I am,
10 whether you might have confused Glenfada Park for Abbey
11 Park?
12 A. Yes.
13 Q. You referred to a photograph in this
14 statement which we have annexed to your statement as
15 AH10.7. Would you mind looking at that with the
16 Tribunal, AH10.7. Is it still your evidence that that
17 photograph depicts the area which you were talking
18 about, whatever it may be called?
19 A. Again, it is very hard to recall the detail.
20 Q. I do not ask for the detail. If you want to,
21 I can read it to you, since the photograph is on the
22 screen. May I read to you from paragraph 29. I will
23 be corrected if I am wrong. You said of this
24 photograph:
25 "My position is marked 2, grid reference 114,
1 and marked with a cross on the attached photograph
2 labelled A."
3 You see at AH10.7 there is indeed a cross.
4 Is it still your recollection that that is the place
5 you intended to talk about?
6 A. What I recall is crouching behind a wooden
7 fence and running for cover opposite -- down
8 Rossville Street and I could have been confused between
9 Glenfada Park and Abbey Park, most certainly. What
10 I recall is crouching at a corner fence and trying to
11 find cover, you know, so I could have been confused,
12 but --
13 LORD SAVILLE: Mrs McGuinness, if you turn to
14 your right you will see it is me asking: you recall
15 a fence?
16 A. Uh-huh exactly.
17 LORD SAVILLE: Was it a fence that looked
18 like the fence in the photograph or can you just not
19 remember what sort of fence it was now?
20 A. It was a wooden fence.
21 LORD SAVILLE: Like the one in the
22 photograph?
23 A. Yes.
24 MR GLASGOW: By reference to that photograph,
25 or the map if you prefer, I think you have them before
1 you, can you give the Tribunal any more help as to
2 where the young man who you thought had been injured or
3 shot was when you saw him?
4 A. No, I do not.
5 Q. You cannot?
6 A. No.
7 Q. For how long did you remain in the area of
8 Westland Street? I know that sounds like a silly
9 question, Mrs McGuinness, I do not mean it to be. In
10 terms, if you like, of minutes or what else was going
11 on, can you help at all as to how long you remained in
12 the area?
13 A. Well, it is actually very hard to recall the
14 length of time.
15 Q. I fully appreciate that.
16 A. I could not help you with that at all.
17 Q. You say, I specifically draw your attention
18 to it without criticism, that you "hung around shocked
19 for a while". I am asking if you can give any help to
20 the Tribunal what you mean by "for a while"?
21 A. I remember being at the bottom of Westland
22 Street and I remember walking back to Creggan and
23 stopping several times to talk to different people, but
24 the length of time I spent at the bottom of Westland
25 Street I could not guess.
1 Q. Did you remain there until the shooting had
2 stopped?
3 A. I do not recall.
4 Q. You do not even recall that?
5 A. No.
6 LORD SAVILLE: Something you say in your
7 statement is that you remember it was still light; is
8 that a recollection you still have?
9 A. Uh-huh.
10 LORD SAVILLE: It had not got dark?
11 A. It had not got dark, no.
12 MR GLASGOW: If we can go back to your
13 statement at AH10.6, you refer to your friend
14 Mitchel McLaughlin, with his little blue van?
15 A. Yes.
16 Q. Would you just like to refresh your memory on
17 34 before I ask you any questions, so you have time to
18 look at it again. Are you with me?
19 A. Yes.
20 Q. Am I right in thinking that would be the
21 gentleman whose full name is John Mitchel McLaughlin,
22 do you know that, if he is a friend of yours?
23 A. I just know him as Mitchel McLaughlin.
24 Q. Linsfort Drive at the time?
25 A. Yes.
1 Q. Is that right?
2 A. Yes.
3 Q. He had a little blue van?
4 A. (Witness nodding).
5 Q. Do you remember why he was ferrying people up
6 and down between Westland Street and the Creggan?
7 A. I remember very clearly, because members of
8 my family would have been the people that he actually
9 gave a lift. Many people were in shock and terrified
10 after the shooting and they were in Westland Street
11 trying to get back to Creggan and anybody that he knew
12 he would have given a lift to and it is a very short
13 drive up and back again, so he actually did, along with
14 -- take people back to Creggan and come back and lift
15 other people and took them to where they found it safe
16 in Creggan.
17 Q. Mrs McGuinness, I am not in any sense
18 under-rating the influence of shock, but in acting in
19 that way as a good neighbour, he was not specifically
20 carrying wounded people who had been injured, but
21 people who he knew were understandably shocked, that is
22 the position, is it?
23 A. He was not carrying people who were wounded,
24 he was giving people a lift back to Creggan.
25 MR GLASGOW: Thank you very much,
1 Mr McGuinness.
2 Questioned by MR ELIAS
3 MR ELIAS: May I ask two matters of
4 clarification, Mrs McGuinness, the same page AH10.6 and
5 the same paragraph, 34, you report that Mitchel
6 McLaughlin made a number of journeys back and forward.
7 Do you remember now how many journeys there were that
8 you saw?
9 A. No, I do not, no.
10 Q. "He reported on the number of dead"; I am
11 a little confused in your statement as to quite what
12 that means?
13 A. Again, I think whenever I gave the statement
14 what I was trying to say was that as we were walking
15 home, people were stopping and say "there's three
16 dead", "there are four dead". The word "reported"
17 actually means as if you were officially trying to do
18 something. What it was was people passing on
19 information as to what was happening in the Bogside to
20 people who were travelling home to the Creggan.
21 Q. If you just look at the statement with me for
22 a moment, "each time he took five or six people back to
23 the Creggan to escape danger and he [Mitchel
24 McLaughlin] reported on the number of dead"; that is
25 what you were saying in the statement?
1 A. I think that -- what inference are you taking
2 out of the word "reported", can I ask you, sir?
3 Q. I simply ask if you know, Mrs McGuinness, to
4 whom was Mitchel McLaughlin "reporting"?
5 A. On several occasions while we were walking to
6 Creggan several cars stopped and we asked them what was
7 happening, right. Well, when somebody has written down
8 "reported", what I am saying is that my friend stopped
9 with us on the road home and told us what was actually
10 happening in the Bogside, because we were getting all
11 sorts of report that there was three dead, four dead or
12 five dead. I think the word "reported" in there and
13 the inference you are taking from it is wrong.
14 Q. I am not trying to take an inference. You
15 are telling us, are you, now, that I have it clearly it
16 was Mitchell McLaughlin reporting to you on the road
17 the number of dead; is that what you are now saying?
18 A. I am saying that we stopped cars who were
19 travelling from the Bogside and asked them what was
20 happening and they told me and other people who were
21 travelling back to Creggan what was happening in the
22 Bogside.
23 Q. I will leave that. Can I go on to paragraph
24 14, just to one point there, please? You were asked
25 about the middle of that paragraph a little earlier:
1 "At some point that day she, that is my
2 mother, listened to the army communications on the
3 shortwave radio."
4 Can we be clear about it, is that what your
5 mother told you, or did you see her doing it?
6 A. That is what she told me.
7 Q. You lived, of course, with her at home, did
8 you not at this time?
9 A. I did indeed, yes.
10 Q. Had you seen her listening to shortwave radio
11 at home at any time?
12 A. Not that I recall, no.
13 Q. When she told you on this day she had been
14 listening to army communications on the shortwave
15 radio, did you ask her where or why?
16 A. No.
17 Q. No questions about it at all?
18 A. No, there was too much else going on that
19 day.
20 Questioned by SIR ALLAN GREEN
21 SIR ALLAN GREEN: Mrs McGuinness, my name is
22 Sir Allan Green. I appear on behalf of some of the
23 soldiers. Could you have in front of you AH10.8. That
24 is the NICRA statement.
25 Do you remember now making that, the occasion
1 of it as it were?
2 A. Vaguely. I know that I made a statement.
3 I cannot remember where I actually did it, but
4 I remember who I gave the statement to.
5 Q. That was within a few days of the actual
6 events?
7 A. Yes.
8 Q. You do not say, I think it is only some 27
9 lines long, you do not say anything there about
10 crossing the barrier and grabbing someone by the hand
11 which you have said in the more recent statement?
12 A. Well, I think that we were -- people who were
13 involved in the march were asked to make statements and
14 I do not even recall who co-ordinated the taking of the
15 statements, but the approach was one of -- that you
16 went in and you gave whatever recollection you had.
17 The second set of statements that we were
18 encouraged to make were done by professional people who
19 tried to prod your memory and tried to get as much
20 detail as you can recall. I think that is the
21 difference in the statements.
22 Q. I can see that, but of course these were
23 things that you remembered very well at the time; that
24 is right, is it not, grabbing someone by the hand and
25 running for your life, as you have put it in the more
1 recent statement?
2 A. Uh-huh.
3 Q. Paragraph 27, 10.4?
4 A. Yes.
5 Q. "I ran for my life west towards the entrance
6 to the car park of Glenfada Park North."
7 There is of course no mention of your
8 sheltering behind a fence at all?
9 A. In my original statement?
10 Q. Yes.
11 A. No.
12 Q. Nothing about that at all?
13 A. No.
14 Q. Then you come, some 18 months ago now, to
15 make the statement to Eversheds. Did you tell the
16 people who were taking the statement from Eversheds
17 that your knowledge of the geography of the Bogside was
18 very limited?
19 A. I do not recall and I do not recall being
20 asked the question, either.
21 Q. You see, it sounds pretty definite, does it
22 not? For example, paragraph 29, you describe getting
23 down on your hunkers alongside the wooden fence and
24 then you mark the photograph, as Mr Glasgow has asked
25 you about, and the plan and so forth.
1 Did you tell them at any stage, because it is
2 certainly not in the statement I do not think "I am
3 very vague about the area in question"; did you say
4 anything like that?
5 A. No, not at the time, no.
6 Q. You say you used the expression a few minute
7 ago that they were prodding you, do you any the
8 impression you give in this statement, the Eversheds
9 statement, is rather more definite than it ought to be?
10 A. When I query the geography of Glenfada Park
11 at that time and Abbey Park, and I am talking about at
12 that time, then I am just not very sure that what
13 I have pointed out is accurate, it could possibly be
14 Abbey Park.
15 Q. Yes, but do you think now looking back at
16 this statement, taking it quite generally, that it
17 sounds and reads rather more definite that it ought to?
18 A. At that part of the statement it does, with
19 reference to Abbey Park and Glenfada Park, yes.
20 Q. You were prodded into saying something rather
21 more definite than was justified?
22 A. No, I think that my recollection of where
23 I was at that time is vague and I have to say that when
24 one somebody works on a map with me I find that very
25 hard to work with.
1 SIR ALLAN GREEN: The point I am making,
2 I will leave it here, is the statement does not sound
3 vague. Paragraph 29 does not sound vague, it does not
4 read vague. That is right, is it not?
5 A. That paragraph does not, no.
6 MR CLARKE: Thank you very much,
7 Mrs McGuinness.
8 LORD SAVILLE: Thank you very much
9 Mrs McGuinness. Somebody will show you the way out.
10 (The witness withdrew)
11 MR CLARKE: Whilst we are waiting for the
12 next witness, Gerry Duddy, it may help to say a propos
13 something that arose recently, these typed statements
14 which have the names ("Donaghy" or "Johnson" in the
15 example) in the top right-hand corner, what appears to
16 have been the position is -- they are not, I think, to
17 be found on any of the signed statements, so it looks
18 as if what happened was that an exercise was made, no
19 doubt for the purpose of presenting the evidence to
20 Lord Widgery, of typing up the manuscript statements
21 and putting in the top right-hand corner the names of
22 the dead and wounded to whom it was thought by whoever
23 performed the exercise that the evidence related.
24 I have at the back of my mind that somewhere
25 in the pin documents I think there is a tabulation of
1 various statements. They are often apparently
2 accurate. The one we have just looked at referring to
3 Donaghy and Johnson is almost certainly accurate. They
4 are on occasions inaccurate. In particular there are
5 a number of statements which seem pretty plainly to be
6 referring to Jack Duddy, but have another name. I have
7 forgotten what it is, it is either McCallen or
8 something of the kind, where whoever has written it has
9 simply got it wrong. That appears to be their
10 provenance.
11 LORD SAVILLE: As I said to Mr Harvey,
12 I think that was my general impression too.
13 (14.27 pm)
14 MR GERRY DUDDY (affirmed)
15 Questioned by MR CLARKE
16 LORD SAVILLE: Mr Duddy, if you look to your
17 right you will see it is me talking to you, but the
18 questions will almost all come from counsel who are
19 sitting in front of me. There is only one thing
20 I would ask you to remember at this stage. Can you
21 talk fairly close to the microphone in front of you so
22 that everybody can hear what you are saying.
23 MR CLARKE: Mr Duddy, thank you very much for
24 coming. Do you have in front of you a statement that
25 you made in June last year, which may we have on the
1 screen as AD146.1?
2 A. I do.
3 Q. Is that statement true, to the best of your
4 knowledge and belief?
5 A. It is.
6 Q. Can we come straight, please, to paragraph 3
7 of your statement and could we highlight that on the
8 screen? You describe being on the march and reaching
9 William Street and walking east and seeing a few boys
10 standing on the wasteground to the north of William
11 Street just beyond Stevensons' bakery, a few soldiers
12 lying on the bakery, on the roof, spanning the crowd
13 and pointing their guns at them and about six boys at
14 point 8 throwing stones and a few bottles at the
15 soldiers on the roof of the old bakery and yourself as
16 standing at approximately the position by the letter B.
17 Could we have a look at the map at AD146.6?
18 If we could highlight the top of the page. The
19 soldiers that you are describing we can see at A and
20 yourself at point B. What is the building you are
21 referring to as "the old bakery"?
22 LORD SAVILLE: I am sorry, Mr Clarke, the
23 soldiers at A, are you sure that is right?
24 MR CLARKE: So sorry, the boys at A and
25 Mr Duddy at B, forgive me. The boys throwing stones
1 and a few bottles at the soldiers on the roof of the
2 old bakery; can you identify what you are describing as
3 "the roof of the old bakery"?
4 A. It is just directly beside the GPO offices.
5 There was a building there with a flat roof and that is
6 where the soldiers were. If you go on in, where A is
7 marked on the map, if you just go on in to the end of
8 the square from there.
9 Q. Could we have a look at P201? That is
10 a picture of the scene and the place where you have
11 described, if I could have control, the boys as being
12 approximately where I have pointed the yellow arrow at
13 the tip of the arrow; can you identify the building at
14 which they were throwing stones?
15 A. You cannot see the building that I am
16 referring to in that picture, it is further on back,
17 off the wasteground.
18 Q. Could we have a look at P199? This is
19 another angle. Can we highlight the bit in the
20 middle? This is looking at it from the other end, with
21 the Presbyterian Church in the foreground. Can you see
22 there the building at which the boys were throwing
23 stones?
24 A. Yes.
25 Q. Which one is it?
1 A. It is the centre one there.
2 Q. If we could have it on blue, please. If you
3 point either with your finger or with a stylus it
4 should make an arrow on the screen so we can all see
5 where you are referring to. Can you do that?
6 A. This building here. (Marked with a blue
7 arrow).
8 Q. It is the building with the flat roof to the
9 east of the Presbyterian Church?
10 A. Whatever -- is that right -- just where
11 I pointed where the arrow was.
12 LORD SAVILLE: Hang on, because the arrow,
13 Mr Duddy, is pointing to the top of the Presbyterian
14 Church; do you really mean that?
15 A. I pointed my finger at that building. Not on
16 the rooftop, at that building there, at that area
17 there. I am not going to say "rooftop".
18 LORD SAVILLE: Mr Clarke, I think the witness
19 is referring to that flat piece. Perhaps you could
20 take those arrows off and you could suggest it to him,
21 in the circumstances?
22 MR CLARKE: As I understand it, it is the
23 building to which I am presently pointing at the tip of
24 where the red arrow is on the screen?
25 A. Yes, I would agree with that.
1 Q. That is the building with the flat roof to
2 the east of the Presbyterian Church.
3 When you saw these boys throwing stones
4 towards the soldiers were the soldiers doing anything
5 in response?
6 A. I just seen them lying there, just seen them
7 moving their guns about, taking aim type of thing.
8 Q. Did you hear any rubber bullets?
9 A. Not that I can mind now.
10 Q. You then, if we can go back to your statement
11 at AD146.1, paragraph 3, describe hearing a single shot
12 to your left, looking north and slightly behind you and
13 turning and seeing Bubbles Donaghy yell out "I am shot"
14 and then laughing because you thought that he had been
15 hit by a rubber bullet, telling him to "take your oil"
16 and him yelling back that he had been "hit by a live
17 one" and a number of fellows going to help him and to
18 carry him away.
19 Before Damien Donaghy yelled out that he was
20 shot the first time, had you noticed him?
21 A. No.
22 Q. When you heard the single shot to the left of
23 you as you were looking north, have you any more
24 precise recollection as to where the shot appeared to
25 have come from?
1 A. I had no idea where the shot came from and at
2 the time I thought it was a rubber bullet being fired.
3 Q. When Damien Donaghy was shot can you
4 recollect with any greater precision now where he was
5 when you saw him?
6 A. He was at the corner of the wasteground by
7 William Street.
8 Q. If we go back to P201, when you say "at the
9 corner of the wasteland"; which wasteland are you
10 referring to?
11 A. The small area that you referred to earlier,
12 that was the land there facing it. (Inaudible).
13 Q. Is that the wasteland to the south of William
14 Street to the left of the photograph?
15 A. To my left.
16 Q. When you say that he was at the corner of the
17 wasteland, can you tell me which corner it is you are
18 referring to?
19 A. The gable end there, that you can see looking
20 from this angle.
21 Q. Could I have control for a moment, please?
22 Are you referring to that gable end?
23 A. That gable end.
24 Q. That is The Nook Bar. Thank you very much.
25 You then describe how you heard a second
1 single shot which hit John Johnston. Had you seen
2 Mr Johnston before you heard the second shot?
3 A. I did not see Mr Johnston.
4 Q. You did not see him at all?
5 A. I did not see Mr Johnston.
6 Q. You simply heard the shot?
7 A. I heard the shot.
8 Q. You describe the throwing of stones and a few
9 bottles across towards the Presbyterian Church by the
10 boys. Can you tell me approximately what the position
11 was in William Street and around; was the march still
12 continuing or was it the tail end of the march or what
13 exactly?
14 A. I think my memory is that it was almost -- it
15 was nearly the tail end of the march, so I was at this
16 time.
17 Q. Could we look please at paragraph 6 of your
18 statement, which is at AD146.2. Can we highlight
19 paragraph 6? You say there that:
20 "Bubbles was doing nothing wrong, nothing to
21 justify him getting shot."
22 You had seen him, as I understand it, just
23 after he was shot?
24 A. That is true.
25 Q. Is what you are saying, that so far as you
1 could tell from when you saw him there was nothing that
2 justified anybody shooting at him at all?
3 A. Nothing at all.
4 Q. You also describe, in the third sentence of
5 this paragraph:
6 "The talk in Derry the week before the march
7 was that the paras were being sent in to rid the
8 streets of the IRA."
9 When you say that was "the talk" in Derry,
10 had you heard that yourself?
11 A. I did.
12 Q. What are we talking about, people talking in
13 the street, people talking in pubs, what exactly do you
14 mean?
15 A. People talking in the street.
16 Q. Can you recollect how soon before the march
17 you had heard that sort of talk?
18 A. That whole week leading up to the march.
19 Q. You are sure, are you, that is the talk that
20 people were having before the march, rather than people
21 saying after the march that it looked as if the paras
22 had been sent in to rid the streets of the IRA?
23 A. Well, the news at the time was that the paras
24 actually said that themselves at a march at Magilligan
25 Beach the week before.
1 Q. Had you been at Magilligan?
2 A. No.
3 Q. Had you heard some report of what the paras
4 are supposed to have said at Magilligan?
5 A. Yes.
6 Q. Which was what?
7 A. That they were coming to Derry and they were
8 going to rid the streets, they actually said they were
9 going to make the streets run red with blood.
10 Q. They were going to make the streets "run with
11 blood"; who had you heard that from?
12 A. Just people.
13 Q. Anybody you can identify?
14 A. No.
15 Q. You describe the events in the Creggan and
16 you say in paragraph 6, in the last three lines:
17 "The army always broke the rules. In the
18 Creggan they were sent in to do a policing job, but
19 deliberately harassed the teenagers, often for
20 nothing."
21 I wonder if you could describe for us
22 a little what the position was in the Creggan so far as
23 any form of policing is concerned. Firstly, I mean did
24 the RUC ever go into the Creggan?
25 A. Yes.
1 Q. Did they patrol in the Creggan?
2 A. Yes.
3 Q. Were there barricades in the Creggan?
4 A. In the outlying areas of the Creggan.
5 Q. What was the purpose of the barricades?
6 A. To keep the police out.
7 Q. To keep the police out.
8 A. (Witness nodding).
9 Q. So they had to make their way in over the
10 barricades or in some other way?
11 A. Yes.
12 Q. Was the purposes of the barricade also to
13 keep the army out?
14 A. Yes.
15 Q. Was there some form of efficient alarm system
16 so that if either the police or the army came in,
17 people would bang dustbin lids and the like to alert
18 others to the fact that the police and army were
19 around?
20 A. That is what was done.
21 Q. Who, if anybody, in fact enforced law and
22 order in the Creggan?
23 A. Nobody that I know of.
24 Q. Were you familiar with gunmen being in the
25 Creggan?
1 A. The only gunmen I knew in the Creggan at that
2 time was the police and the army.
3 Q. That was the only one, was it?
4 A. That I knew of.
5 Q. Were gunmen to be seen walking around the
6 Creggan, patrolling it?
7 A. Which gunmen are you referring to?
8 Q. I do not mean either the police or the army,
9 civilians?
10 A. I never seen any.
11 Q. If we could come to paragraph 8 of your
12 statement, and if we could highlight that. You
13 describe reaching the junction of William Street and
14 Rossville Street and there being stewards standing on
15 the corner trying to make the march turn right and head
16 south. You say:
17 "I knew that a riot would be going on further
18 east along William Street at the army barricade and so
19 I pushed past the stewards as I wanted to see what was
20 happening."
21 Just tell us something about the scene at the
22 junction. Can you tell us roughly how many stewards
23 there were standing on the corner and trying to make
24 the march turn right?
25 A. By the time I got to the junction of William
1 Street/Rossville Street, the main body of the crowd had
2 already turned up Rossville Street and there were still
3 stewards this at the corner asking people to go up
4 Rossville Street and at that time we had heard that the
5 march was not getting through to the Guildhall Square
6 and that they were going to have a rally in Free Derry
7 Corner.
8 Q. My question was whether you could tell us the
9 sort of numbers of stewards around at the corner?
10 A. All I seen -- I seen about a dozen of them at
11 that time.
12 Q. They were asking people to go south, go down
13 Rossville Street?
14 A. Yes.
15 Q. And you wanted to go east so you just pushed
16 past them, as you say?
17 A. I do not know -- I do not know where the push
18 came, but I walked past them, yes.
19 Q. You say that you wanted to see what was
20 happening; did you know then there was rioting going on
21 at the barrier?
22 A. We heard there was a bit of trouble about the
23 barricade. I did not know then actually where the
24 barricade was, so ...
25 Q. Were you just going to see what the trouble
1 was, or to join in?
2 A. I wanted to see what was happening.
3 Q. Then you describe being afraid of getting
4 soaked in dye as a result of which your father would
5 have known that you were rioting and you would have got
6 a clip from him and you say:
7 "When I got to the eastern end of William
8 Street I could see that a really good riot was going
9 on, although I was quite small at the time and could
10 not really push my way to the front to see what was
11 going on."
12 What did you see when you got to the eastern
13 end of William Street which constituted a "really good
14 riot"?
15 A. To a 14 year old seeing a few stones and that
16 being fired was a good riot. I never actually got to
17 near the barricade, but it was --
18 Q. How close did you get to the barricade?
19 A. I was at the corner of Chamberlain Street.
20 Q. The corner of Chamberlain Street. How long
21 did you stay at the corner? About 20 minutes, I think
22 you say in paragraph 9?
23 A. I mentioned 20 minutes, but I think that was
24 from the time that I got from the corner of
25 Rossville Street up to the barricade and back down
1 again.
2 Q. When the water cannon came you turned and
3 walked first back up William Street and then down south
4 down Rossville Street; is that right?
5 A. That is true.
6 Q. You describe in paragraph 10 at the bottom
7 getting level with Kells Walk; can we go to the top of
8 the next page:
9 "At approximately the point marked C" and
10 seeing your brother, Jackie, him telling you to watch
11 out because your brother Billy was looking for you and
12 saying "he has already caught me and told me to get
13 home". How old was your brother Billy at the time?
14 A. Billy was my older brother.
15 Q. And you said to Jackie that if he did not see
16 Billy, "he was not to tell Billy he had seen me as
17 I was not meant to be there"?
18 A. No, you got that all wrong.
19 Q. I am so sorry, I was reading your statement,
20 did you want to say something different?
21 A. I said to Jackie that he better watch out,
22 that Billy was looking for him. Not the way you put
23 it.
24 Q. I am sorry. You say you just had the usual
25 kind of chat between two brothers:
1 "He told me he had been up by the army
2 barricade at the east end of William Street. After
3 a few minutes Jackie said he was heading off and the
4 last time I saw him was as he crossed Rossville Street
5 and started to walk in a southeasterly direction
6 towards the wasteground towards the flats."
7 Can we just have a look at AD146.6? Could we
8 highlight the middle of the page. You describe
9 yourself as being at point C. Was that approximately
10 the point which was the last time when you saw your
11 brother Jackie Duddy?
12 A. It was.
13 Q. You describe then in paragraph 11 of your
14 statement standing at point C for a few minutes and
15 then hearing shooting and the people in the area around
16 you at the northern end of Rossville Street starting to
17 run south down Rossville Street. When you heard that
18 shooting, did you see the army coming in at the same
19 time?
20 A. I heard the noise of the tanks coming in.
21 Q. Is that the first thing that you heard before
22 the shooting?
23 A. Yes.
24 Q. And then the tanks come in and you hear
25 shooting. If we could go to your statement at
1 paragraph 11, AD146.3, you describe there, if we can
2 highlight that:
3 "The initial reaction of the crowd was that
4 the army were starting to come in with rubber bullets
5 and CS gas and people started to bend down and pick up
6 stones ready for a confrontation with them."
7 (2.45 pm)
8 Whereabouts were people doing that?
9 A. At the corner of Rossville Street.
10 Q. At the corner of Rossville Street and William
11 Street?
12 A. Yes.
13 Q. What about where you were, just to the east
14 of Kells Walk; were people doing that there?
15 A. That is more or less the general area.
16 Kells Walk and the corner of Rossville Street and
17 William Street is more or less beside one another.
18 Q. Then you saw the Pigs coming in from Little
19 James Street and the crowd run into the wasteground
20 from William Street and Chamberlain Street and you saw
21 the army coming in from William Street. Then everyone
22 started running south down Rossville Street. Did some
23 people stand their ground when the army came in?
24 A. At this time people realised it was not
25 rubber bullets, it was live bullets being fired and
1 everybody started running.
2 Q. Did you hear some rubber bullets being fired
3 first?
4 A. I thought it was rubber bullets, but then
5 I realised it was live bullets, so I started running.
6 Q. You describe running south down
7 Rossville Street, across the wasteground of Pilot Row
8 and passing a small wire fence. Could we have a look
9 at picture P204? Could we have P407? Perhaps we can
10 try 204. There is a fence which we can see in this
11 photograph here; is that the one that you are referring
12 to?
13 A. It is.
14 Q. You ran ahead and you then went into the car
15 park, as I understand it, and, having looked at the
16 exit way between blocks 1 and 2 which I am showing on
17 the plan, saw that there were too many people and
18 decided to go out the exit between blocks 2 and 3, is
19 that right?
20 A. That is true.
21 Q. When you were doing that did you hear any
22 sound of firing coming towards you from the direction
23 of the flats, any of the blocks on the flats?
24 A. I did not.
25 Q. Did you see anybody with what appeared to be
1 a gun or a weapon?
2 A. See a weapon or a gun from where?
3 Q. In the flats or in the car park of the flats?
4 A. I did not.
5 Q. You then, as you were going towards blocks 2
6 and 3, dived for cover behind the wall. Can we have
7 a look at P205; is the wall -- can I have control of
8 this screen, please -- that you dived for cover behind
9 the wall that runs bar parallel to block 2 that I am
10 pointing out with an arrow?
11 A. That is it.
12 Q. Do you recollect whereabouts behind the wall
13 you were along the line of block 2?
14 A. I would not be far behind where the red arrow
15 is pointing now.
16 Q. That is about three flats in from the left as
17 we look at photograph P205. Then you saw, as
18 I understand it, a Pig, an army vehicle roughly at the
19 entrance to the car park and saw soldiers firing. Is
20 that roughly somewhere where I am pointing now at the
21 entrance to the car park between block 1 north end and
22 the end of Chamberlain Street on its west side?
23 A. Roughly around that area.
24 Q. Could you see approximately how many soldiers
25 were firing?
1 A. I could not.
2 Q. Or could you detect at all what they were
3 firing at?
4 A. No, I was too busy covering.
5 Q. You then decided you had to get out of the
6 car park and crawled along the wall towards the exit
7 between blocks 1 and 2, so that is in the direction
8 that I am pointing in the arrow, is that right?
9 A. That is true.
10 Q. And you emerged from the other side of the
11 alleyway and you saw a body you later found out to be
12 that of Barney McGuigan as you emerged from the
13 alleyway between blocks 1 and 2?
14 A. That is true.
15 Q. Can you give us any idea of the timescale, by
16 which I mean this: from the time you started running
17 down Rossville Street to the time you came upon Barney
18 McGuigan's body, do you know roughly how long a period
19 of time elapsed?
20 A. I would not have a clue.
21 Q. You then ran towards the northern block of
22 Joseph Place and along the western side and out to
23 cross over Rossville Street shortly before Free Derry
24 Corner. Can we look at paragraph 17 of your statement,
25 which is at AD146.4? You say there in paragraph 17
1 that when you got to Westland Street you were very
2 frightened, you thought it was unbelievable and there
3 were bodies lying around who had been shot and people
4 in the area of Westland Street were standing around,
5 saying that three or four people were dead.
6 Do you mean by that that when you got to
7 Westland Street there were bodies in Westland Street,
8 or there were bodies somewhere else that you had seen
9 upon the way?
10 A. There was no bodies in Westland Street. The
11 bodies I referred to would have been the body of Barney
12 McGuigan and the body I saw lying in the courtyard of
13 the back of the Rossville Flats.
14 Q. That, as we now know, was the body of your
15 brother?
16 A. That is true.
17 Q. You then walked in a northwesterly direction
18 up Westland Street along the New Road and then to the
19 Creggan. Could I ask you to identify the New Road?
20 Could we have Q2 on the screen? A number of people
21 have referred to "the New Road" and I am not quite sure
22 which one it is. We can see Westland Street, which is
23 at the bottom of the screen and that leads up to
24 Lone Moor Road. Is the New Road on this map?
25 A. The New Road, it would be at the top of
1 Westland Street, it would be in there, you can see it
2 there.
3 Q. Is it marked the "New Road"?
4 A. I cannot see -- all I can see is an "TR" on
5 it, that is all I can see on it. It is beside the
6 factory there.
7 Q. Is it the road I am now pointing out?
8 A. That would be the New Road.
9 MR CLARKE: Thank you very much. Westland
10 Street as it turns slightly to the left on the map goes
11 into the New Road. That is very helpful. Those are
12 all the questions I wanted to ask.
13 LORD SAVILLE: I think what we will do now is
14 take a ten minute break so that the LiveNote writer can
15 have a short rest and then continue with this witness
16 in about ten minutes time.
17 (3.00 pm)
18 (A short adjournment)
19 (3.14 pm)
20 Questioned by MR LAWSON
21 MR LAWSON: Mr Duddy, first of all can you
22 help me about this, please: can we have on the screen
23 AD146.1? Paragraph 2, could that be highlighted. In
24 paragraph 2 of your statement, this is the one to
25 Eversheds, as you will remember, made in, I think, June
1 1999, which has not, I think, been referred to yet, you
2 said:
3 "It seemed to be a great day and a good
4 laugh."
5 A. Yes, that is what I said.
6 Q. You were looking forward to the march?
7 A. Yes.
8 Q. You then refer to your brother telling you
9 that there was going to be trouble on the march?
10 A. He did.
11 Q. Was that the first you had heard of trouble
12 on the march?
13 A. No, I think he was just being a big brother,
14 he did not want me getting hurt or anything, so he was
15 trying to warn me off.
16 Q. You had heard there was going to be trouble
17 on the march before, had you?
18 A. Well, it was the talk for the week before the
19 march that there was going to be trouble.
20 Q. That is what you told us about and refer to
21 later in your statement about the paras being sent in
22 to rid the streets of the IRA?
23 A. Yes.
24 Q. What about this expression to "make the
25 streets run red with blood", where did that come from?
1 A. That came from Magilligan the week before.
2 Q. Came from?
3 A. Magilligan Beach the week before, British
4 soldiers actually came out with that statement.
5 Q. Who did you hear that from?
6 A. From people.
7 Q. When?
8 A. The week before the march took place.
9 Q. That was something you knew all about when
10 you saw Eversheds in June 1999, the streets running red
11 with blood as being the threat issued by the paras?
12 A. Yes, that is what I heard.
13 Q. Why did you not tell Eversheds that?
14 A. Why did I not tell Eversheds, what?
15 Q. That you had heard there was this graphic
16 threat that they were going to make the streets run red
17 with blood; if that is true, why did you not tell that
18 to Eversheds?
19 A. I must have forgot.
20 Q. You must have forgot?
21 A. I must have forgot, if it is not in my
22 statement.
23 Q. Have you forgotten about seeing gunmen in the
24 Creggan Estate area?
25 A. No.
1 Q. You have not?
2 A. I did not see any, that is where I have not
3 forgotten.
4 Q. That is the truth, is it?
5 A. That is my truth.
6 Q. How long have you lived in the Creggan?
7 A. I was born in the Creggan area and I have
8 lived there all my life.
9 Q. You were 14 at the time of Bloody Sunday?
10 A. I was.
11 Q. And you had never seen a gunman there?
12 A. I never seen any at that time.
13 Q. Apart from the policemen?
14 A. At that time, yes.
15 Q. Who was the policemen you have told us about,
16 the senior policeman?
17 A. I never told you about any senior policeman.
18 Q. I thought you said there was a senior
19 policeman there?
20 A. I do not know what you are saying.
21 Q. With a gun?
22 A. No, I was asked the question did I ever see
23 gunmen and I said, yes, I seen policemen with guns and
24 soldiers with guns.
25 Q. But never any civilian with a gun?
1 A. Not at that time I never seen civilians with
2 guns.
3 Q. Not once?
4 A. Not once. At that time.
5 Q. When was the first time you did see civilians
6 with guns in the Creggan?
7 A. I cannot mind. I said I cannot mind.
8 Q. You cannot remember?
9 A. No.
10 Q. You said nobody as far as you were aware
11 enforced or kept law and order in the Creggan, is that
12 true?
13 A. At that time I did not know who was keeping
14 law and order or whatever.
15 Q. What about the IRA, were they the force
16 responsible for keeping law and order on the Creggan?
17 A. I do not know.
18 Q. Just tell us this: did you know anybody on
19 the Creggan who was in the IRA?
20 A. At the time, no.
21 Q. No-one?
22 A. At the time of Bloody Sunday I did not know
23 anybody in the IRA.
24 Q. You did not know anybody, you had never seen
25 a gunman; had you heard of gunmen operating on the
1 Creggan?
2 A. I heard of gunmen, but I never seen any.
3 Q. You never saw one?
4 A. Not at that time.
5 Q. That is the truth?
6 A. That is my truth.
7 Q. Could you help us with this, still on the
8 screen is that paragraph of your statement. I want to
9 ask you for confirmation. You refer to a friend of
10 yours called Paul McDaid?
11 A. Yes.
12 Q. From Runmore Drive?
13 A. Runmore Drive.
14 Q. Not Aberfoyle Crescent, do you know Aberfoyle
15 Crescent?
16 A. I do not.
17 Q. Paul McDaid as far as you know, is he still
18 around?
19 A. He is.
20 Q. He is still living in Derry?
21 A. Yes.
22 Q. Can I then just remind you and trigger these
23 questions after we highlight paragraph 3 of the same
24 page, which is where you are referring to the troops
25 that you had seen on the roof of the old bakery that
1 you have pointed out to us, yes?
2 A. Yes.
3 Q. And stones being thrown and Damien Donaghy
4 being shot, putting it in shorthand?
5 A. Yes.
6 MR LAWSON: Right. You were asked to look at
7 a photograph, perhaps we can look at it again, P179.
8 LORD SAVILLE: Do you mean 179 or 197?
9 MR LAWSON: Maybe my note is wrong, it is
10 197, the photograph to which Mr Clarke referred.
11 LORD SAVILLE: I do not think it is that one
12 either, I am afraid.
13 MR CLARKE: 199 or 201.
14 MR LAWSON: That is not the one I had in
15 mind. That will do. Can we enlarge perhaps the bottom
16 half of that? We can look at it from this
17 perspective. You recognise that, do you, Mr Duddy?
18 A. I do.
19 Q. You have indicated that there were soldiers
20 on the little flat roof which is the far side as we
21 look at the photograph of the Presbyterian Church?
22 A. Yes, that is what I said.
23 Q. Yes. And the group of boys that were
24 throwing stones at them were standing on that bit of
25 wasteground on what is the photographer's side of
1 William Street, yes, somewhere just below, if we look
2 where the car is between the "m" of William and the "S"
3 of Street?
4 A. No, they were on the wasteground.
5 Q. Which bit of wasteground?
6 A. In front of the flat roof.
7 Q. If it could be so arranged with whatever
8 colour is appropriate, could you point on the screen to
9 where they were roughly, put an arrow there?
10 A. (Marked with an arrow - AD146.7).
11 Q. And there were, what, about half a dozen of
12 them?
13 A. That is what I saw.
14 LORD SAVILLE: Do you want to record that
15 one, Mr Lawson?
16 MR LAWSON: Yes, sir, I think it would be
17 helpful to do.
18 LORD SAVILLE: I wonder if someone could give
19 us the number.
20 MR LAWSON: I think it would be AD146.7.
21 I do not think we recorded the earlier ones, is that
22 right? AD146.7, please. Mr Glasgow helpfully reminds
23 me that your marking of the roof was not previously
24 recorded. The roof you are talking about is just to
25 the camera side of that arrow and behind in effect the
1 Presbyterian Church, is it not, we can just see it
2 sticking out there?
3 A. Just there. (Marked with a red arrow -
4 AD146.7).
5 Q. Fine, that is the building you are talking
6 about, the red arrow?
7 A. Yes.
8 Q. Thank you. Damien Donaghy, was he one of the
9 stone throwers?
10 A. I never saw Damien Donaghy throwing stones.
11 Q. If he was throwing stones, it was not as seen
12 by you?
13 A. I never saw him throwing stones.
14 Q. Perhaps finally you may assist us in this
15 respect: from what you have told us, when you saw
16 Damien Donaghy shot or gathered he had been shot from
17 his reaction, that was on the other side of William
18 Street, was it not?
19 A. Yes.
20 Q. Was he on the corner? Again, look at that
21 photograph, was he on the corner of the building that
22 we can see just above the "m" of William Street?
23 A. There was a bit of wasteground there, yes.
24 Q. Could you perhaps using, if the colour could
25 be changed to green, could you mark on there
1 approximately where he was when he was shot?
2 A. (Marked with a green arrow - AD146.7). In at
3 the gable.
4 Q. Sorry?
5 A. As I say, he was in at the gable, near enough
6 at the gable.
7 Q. At the gable sort of on that corner?
8 A. On the wasteground, yes.
9 Q. Just on the wasteground, just tucked away
10 behind the corner of the gable end of that building?
11 A. In that area there at the gable, yes.
12 Q. You did not see him throwing any stones, you
13 saw others throwing stones apparently at the soldiers
14 on the old bakery roof?
15 A. That is true.
16 Q. If we could store that, so to speak, as 146.7
17 in its now current form. Could we look on the screen,
18 I hope I get the number right this time, at P201? That
19 you were shown, Mr Duddy, perhaps you will recognise
20 it, is taken from a different perspective looking at
21 the same sort of wasteground. You can see that
22 building with nine windows, can you not, more or less
23 in the middle of the screen?
24 A. I can.
25 Q. People have talked about it as being Richie's
1 factory?
2 A. Yes.
3 Q. Right. Did you see any soldiers there?
4 A. I did not see any soldiers there.
5 Q. And you were perhaps, could you show to us,
6 if it is possible to do so on this, perhaps I should
7 have asked on the other, can you indicate roughly, if
8 you were given say the red colour, where you were
9 standing when you were observing these events?
10 A. I was there first. (Marked with red arrow
11 below left - AD146.8).
12 Q. First could we mark that. About there?
13 A. Yes.
14 Q. At first and then?
15 A. (Marked with red arrow above right -
16 AD146.8).
17 Q. So you crossed over from what we know to be
18 the north side of William Street?
19 A. Yes.
20 Q. Over to the south side?
21 A. I did.
22 Q. I am just saying that so that if anyone looks
23 at the transcript later on they can make sense of it.
24 Those two red arrows mark your position thus. Could
25 that then be AD146.8, please?
1 You have indicated to us you saw no soldiers
2 in that building, the building with nine windows?
3 A. That is true.
4 Q. Did you see any youths throwing anything at
5 that building?
6 A. No.
7 Q. Did you see by any chance a young man
8 crawling up to that building and throwing something in
9 through one of the ground floor windows?
10 A. No.
11 Q. If that had happened, do you think you would
12 have been able to see it?
13 A. I do not know there was a lot of people about
14 at the time.
15 Q. In addition to the half a dozen youths who
16 were chucking stones?
17 A. Yes.
18 Q. There was quite a lot of rubber bullets being
19 fired, is that right?
20 A. Not that I -- not particularly.
21 Q. Not unusually you mean, it was quite common,
22 was it, in a riot situation for rubber bullets to be
23 fired?
24 A. Yes.
25 Q. This was quite a common bit of rioting that
1 was going on, was it?
2 A. Not particularly.
3 Q. Was it an unusual bit of rioting?
4 A. It was just a few young lads throwing stones
5 at the army.
6 Q. Is this before the "really good riot" going
7 on at barrier 14?
8 A. This is a good 20, 25 minutes before it.
9 Q. Just think about that, 20 or 25 minutes
10 before that riot?
11 A. Well, that is what I would think of.
12 Q. I do not want to tie you down precisely to
13 minutes --
14 A. I could not give you precise minutes.
15 Q. Quite a long time?
16 A. It seemed quite a long time.
17 Q. At the time you saw the stone throwing by the
18 boys on the wasteground, the bit we are talking about
19 now where had the march gone, was the march still
20 passing by or had it gone?
21 A. We are more or less at the tail end of it at
22 this time.
23 Q. The march had more or less gone?
24 A. When I seen the young lads throwing stones,
25 yes.
1 Q. That is when Damien Donaghy, as you heard
2 later, and John Johnston were shot?
3 A. I heard the shot and then I heard Damien
4 Donaghy shout out that he had been hit and I laughed at
5 the time because I thought he was hit with a rubber
6 bullet and then another shot rang out which I heard
7 earlier hit John Johnston.
8 Q. You thought at the time they were both rubber
9 bullets?
10 A. At the start, yes.
11 Q. You had heard shooting before, sadly,
12 I imagine, yes?
13 A. Yes.
14 Q. Both baton guns, rubber bullet guns and live
15 rounds being fired?
16 A. Yes.
17 Q. You could not tell which was which on that
18 day?
19 A. Not particularly, no.
20 Q. I think I heard you correctly, you did not
21 actually see John Johnston shot?
22 A. I did not see John Johnston at all, I just
23 heard about it.
24 Q. If we look at the bottom on page AD146.1,
25 paragraph 3, the last sentence after you have referred
1 to Donaghy or Bubbles being shot, I think it is clear
2 enough, your statement then says:
3 "A number of fellows went to help him" that
4 is Donaghy, yes?
5 A. Yes.
6 Q. And carry him away. As they did so there was
7 a second single shot which hit John Johnston?
8 A. Yes, that is what I said.
9 Q. That is not your recollection, that is what
10 someone told you later, is it?
11 A. Yes, that is true.
12 Q. You had heard what you thought were rubber
13 bullet shots being fired, only later to discover that
14 they were in fact live rounds?
15 A. That is true.
16 Q. Can you help about this, please, in relation
17 to page 146.2 of your statement at paragraph 6, at the
18 end of it Mr Clarke asked you a few questions about
19 this at the end of that paragraph, during the course of
20 which you had talked of not hearing any nail bombs that
21 day, yes?
22 A. Yes.
23 Q. Pausing there, you would recognise the sound
24 of a nail bomb?
25 A. You would.
1 Q. They were not uncommon, were they?
2 A. Well, I heard a few.
3 Q. In riots?
4 A. It is possible.
5 Q. Where else would you hear them?
6 A. I heard nail bombs.
7 Q. Yes, and petrol bombs?
8 A. Well, you do not hear petrol bombs, you see
9 them.
10 Q. You have seen petrol bombs?
11 A. Yes.
12 Q. Then you conclude that paragraph, does this
13 accurately reflect your own view, you see those last
14 few lines:
15 "When the teenagers would riot the army would
16 reply with rubber bullets."
17 A. Yes.
18 Q. With Bubbles being shot by a live round they
19 bent the rules?
20 A. Yes.
21 Q. You meant that, did you?
22 A. Yes.
23 Q. What were the ordinary rules?
24 A. If we threw stones, they fired rubber bullets
25 or gas.
1 Q. And that was fair enough?
2 A. Yes.
3 Q. What do the rules provide for nail bombs
4 being thrown?
5 A. I do not know.
6 Q. Were you still only allowed to use rubber
7 bullets?
8 A. I do not know because I never heard any nail
9 bombs that day.
10 Q. You are giving us the benefit of your
11 experience about what the rules were. On other
12 occasions when nail bombs were thrown, were the rules
13 different?
14 A. Can you tell me what this has to do with
15 Bloody Sunday?
16 Q. Can you answer my question: were the rules
17 different?
18 A. I do not know.
19 Q. What about petrol bombs, were the rules
20 different then?
21 A. I do not know.
22 Q. Would you tell us if you did?
23 A. I do not know.
24 Q. Further down the same page, you said in
25 paragraph 8 "there was a really good riot going on"?
1 A. Yes, that is what I believed it.
2 Q. You pushed your way through to see what was
3 going on?
4 A. I did.
5 Q. And then you candidly said:
6 "As a youngster of 14 you had to go in and
7 join in with the riot"?
8 A. I did not say I had to go and join in with
9 the riot. I said I wanted to see what was happening.
10 Q. Forgive me, look at what is on the screen:
11 "As a young lad of 14", the last two lines
12 there, "you had to go and join in with the riot so the
13 next day at school you could tell your mates where you
14 had been and what you had done."
15 Did you mean that?
16 A. Oh, yes.
17 Q. Did you go to join in?
18 A. At the start I wanted to, but I did not.
19 Q. Why was that, because they brought the water
20 cannon up?
21 A. Possibility, yes.
22 Q. You said when Mr Clarke asked you about what
23 you meant by a "really good riot" your actual words
24 "seeing a few stones and that" being fired?
25 A. Yes, well.
1 Q. "Seeing a few stones and that being fired"',
2 what is the "that"?
3 A. There were placards, bits of timber and
4 things being thrown on the day.
5 Q. I did not catch it?
6 A. Placards.
7 Q. Placards, bits of timber and things, what
8 else being thrown, then?
9 A. Well, that is what I meant by things, bits of
10 timber, placards.
11 Q. What does "fired" mean?
12 A. Fired?
13 Q. Yes?
14 A. Thrown, thrown.
15 Q. Thrown?
16 A. Yes.
17 Q. I just wondered, I do not want to be
18 pedantic. I wondered why did you refer to things being
19 "fired" at the soldiers as being part of a "really
20 good riot"?
21 A. I perceived "fired" as "thrown".
22 Q. Help me about a couple of other things, if
23 you are willing to do so.
24 A. Certainly.
25 Q. So as to give the headline for it, on page 3
1 of your statement at paragraph 11, you referred, just
2 to remind you of it, you referred to seeing the Pigs
3 coming in to the Rossville Street area from Little
4 James Street?
5 A. Yes.
6 Q. Is that right?
7 A. Yes.
8 Q. The crowd ran off, is that right?
9 A. It is.
10 Q. As did you?
11 A. Yes.
12 Q. If we look down to the next paragraph,
13 paragraph 12, you ran off, is this right, as a fair
14 summary, you ran south down Rossville Street, yes, into
15 the car park for the Rossville Flats?
16 A. From where I was standing I crossed over the
17 wasteground and went to the back of the Rossville
18 Flats, yes.
19 Q. Is this right, then there was firing?
20 A. Well, there was firing when I was running.
21 I heard firing when I was running.
22 Q. From where?
23 A. Coming from behind me.
24 Q. One shot or more than one shot?
25 A. More than one shot.
1 Q. Lots of shots or a few shots, or what?
2 A. I heard a few shots.
3 Q. A few shots?
4 A. Yes.
5 Q. Much later on, if we go to page 4, paragraph
6 16 of your statement -- I am sorry to jump around, if
7 you want to read into the context of it, do say -- this
8 is at a later stage, you remember, when you were
9 talking of running towards the northern block of
10 Joseph Place, yes?
11 A. Yes.
12 Q. And then Lisfannon Park into Westland Street,
13 yes?
14 A. Yes.
15 Q. Shooting was still going on?
16 A. There was still a few single shots being
17 fired.
18 Q. From?
19 A. I do not know.
20 Q. You could not tell?
21 A. I could not tell.
22 Q. You would not be able to tell whether they
23 were army shots or anybody else's shots?
24 A. All I knew they were shots and I was getting
25 out of the way.
1 MR LAWSON: Thank you.
2 MR ELIAS: No questions.
3 SIR ALLAN GREEN: No questions.
4 LORD SAVILLE: Mr Clarke, do you have any
5 further questions?
6 MR CLARKE: No, thank you.
7 LORD SAVILLE: Thank you, Mr Duddy, very much
8 indeed.
9 I think we will have to bring proceedings to
10 an end today and we will start again tomorrow at 9.30.
11 (3.34 pm)
12 (Proceedings adjourned until
13 Tuesday, 12th December 2000 at 9.30 am)
14 MR MICHAEL FOX (sworn)............................... 1
15 Questioned by MR CLARKE.............................. 1
16 Questioned by MR O'HANLON........................... 21
17 Questioned by MR GLASGOW............................ 23
18 questioned by MR ELIAS.............................. 36
19 Questioned by MR CLARKE............................. 38
20 MR PADRAIG O'MIANAIN (sworn)........................ 39
21 Questioned by MR CLARKE
22 (through the interpreter)........................... 39
23 Questioned by MR GLASGOW............................ 52
24 Questioned by MR ELIAS.............................. 56
25 Questioned by MR CLARKE............................. 60
1 MS ANNE HARKIN (affirmed)........................... 64
2 Questioned by MR CLARKE............................. 64
3 Questioned by MR ARTHUR HARVEY...................... 88
4 Questioned by MR O'HANLON........................... 93
5 Questioned by MR GLASGOW........................... 101
6 Questioned by MR ELIAS............................. 121
7 Questioned by SIR ALLAN GREEN...................... 123
8 MR GERRY DUDDY (affirmed).......................... 128
9 Questioned by MR CLARKE............................ 128
10 Questioned by MR LAWSON............................ 148