Martin McCauley was shot three times by police in the 1982 attack that killed his friend Michael Tighe.
Lawyers for a man accused of the murders of three RUC officers have asked permission from the Chief Constable to use material from the Stalker Sampson inquest in mounting a defence, a barrister revealed today.
Defence counsel for Martin McCauley, Andrew Moriarity, revealed that lawyers from Madden & Finucane have sought permission from the Chief Constable to utilise the Stalker Sampson material that was generated over the course of the inquest.
“We received a holding response,” he told Craigavon Magistrates Court but added that having had personal experience in the inquest, the defence anticipate receiving a “very considerable” amount of material.
On 24 May 1984 an inquiry under Deputy Chief Constable John Stalker of the Greater Manchester Police was opened into three specific cases where it was alleged that a specially trained undercover RUC team known as the “Headquarters Mobile Support Unit” had carried out a “shoot-to-kill” policy.
One of those incidents was on 24 November 1982 when an RUC undercover unit shot and killed Michael Tighe and wounded his friend Martin McCauley at an IRA arms cache on a farm near Lurgan.
McCauley is currently on bail charged with the murders of RUC officers Sergeant Sean Quinn and Constables Paul Hamilton and Allan McCloy on 27 October 1982.
The three officers were in an unmarked car on the the Kinnego Embankment near Lurgan when a 200lb (90kg) bomb was detonated remotely by way of a command wire.
Responsibility for the explosion, which left a 3.5m deep crater in the road, was later claimed by the IRA.
McCauley, one of the so-called ‘Columbia Three’ – three men who were arrested at Bogota International Airport in August 2001 for allegedly training FARC rebels, was extradited from the Republic of Ireland last month and the court has heard the 62-year-old denies the offences.
During a fiercely contested bail application in February when he was initially charged with the murders, the court heard police believe they can link McCauley to the scene of the command wire by forensic evidence.
The court heard how a “number of items” were retrieved from the scene including cigarette butts, plastic sheeting, the command wire used to detonate the massive device and motorcycle helmets used by the killers.
A prosecuting lawyer revealed that having been subjected to modern forensic tests DNA attributable to McCauley had been uncovered on the cigarette butts, further revealing that the odds of it coming from someone else were “over a billion.”
While Martin McCauley’s DNA was not found on the motorcycle helmets used by the murder gang as they fled the scene, the court heard there were profiles of other men suspected of involvement uncovered but that those suspects had since died.
Despite police objections that McCauley posed a risk of flight and of committing further offences given the charges which arose in Columbia, he was granted bail but only freed after £100,000 in cash sureties had been lodged with the court.
The case had been scheduled for a committal hearing next week which would have seen the case elevated to the Crown Court but today Mr Moriarity asked for that to be adjourned.
He told District Judge Michael Ranaghan given the amount of material expected to be received from the Stalker Sampson report, it will take time for the defence to trawl through it.
Judge Ranaghan agreed and he also, on the basis of “equality of arms,” extended legal aid to allow a senior barrister to be instructed for the defence.
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