Into The Dark: Taking IRA confessions… with a little help from the pope
06 November 2005
THE words of Pope John Paul II helped me gain many a confession from guilt-ridden IRA men.
“Murder is murder is murder,” said John Paul II during his visit to Ireland in 1979, and there was no mistaking the genuine admonishment in his tone.
From January 1979, I spent five years as a detective in nationalist west Belfast - based first in Andersonstown station and later at Woodbourne.
When I arrived in the ‘wild west’ from Bangor, where I was based for a short time, an older detective asked: “What did you do to deserve to be sent to this God-forsaken hellhole?”
“I volunteered. I wanted a challenge,” I answered truthfully.
He shook his head in astonishment as I explained that “I didn’t like the sort of crime I was investigating in Bangor”.
During those years in west Belfast we worked under enormous pressure, under constant threat of murder from republicans, as did officers in other frontline stations.
In the late 1970s/early 1980s, PIRA had become a very efficient killing machine. Their absolute disregard for human life was truly awful to witness, and we followed too many coffins of brave RUC men who had been cut down by IRA cowards.
Yet, there were still an awful lot of decent people in west Belfast who wanted us there, people who quietly, and at times anonymously, would help us get to grips with those responsible for terrorist atrocities despite the terrible risks to themselves.
I had listened with interest to what Pope John Paul II had preached about the evil of violence on his 1979 visit.
I knew from interviews with PIRA ’soldiers’ that the ordinary volunteer assumed what he was doing in the name of Irish freedom was morally legitimate.
Many of the terrorists we interviewed believed wholeheartedly they’d at least the tacit approval of the Catholic Church. Yet, now the pope himself had made it clear the taking of a human life could never be justified.
Following discussions with Catholic friends, I bought an LP of Pope John Paul’s address.
I played it over and over again at home until I knew most of the lines by heart.
Sometimes I would quote some of these lines during interviews with terrorists, and always to great effect.
Many of the republicans who made murder confessions to me were moved to do so by those words of John Paul II.
They went to prison at peace with themselves. Hardened paramilitaries would listen intently as I argued that neither their pope nor their Maker would ever forgive them for such disgusting murders.
This was no cynical exercise. I firmly believed what I was saying.
I fully understood that before any man can kill another, he has to dehumanise his intended victim.
The PIRA found it easy to dehumanise the Army or the RUC.
But problems would arise later when volunteers who had killed found themselves revisited by the horrific images in their dreams, or even in broad daylight in the form of flashbacks.
They had not expected this, but it is a fact of life.
Guilt is a terrible thing, and man is not born evil. Paramilitaries could kill - they did kill.
But at home in later years, in the quietness of the night, they are revisited relentlessly by images of the dead, by the enormity of their crimes.
I know this to be the case because I recorded long and detailed statements from many IRA volunteers who broke down in tears during interview and confessed to their involvement in such crimes.
The first thing a murderer feels once he has confessed his crime is relief.
The atmosphere in the interview room is suddenly transformed by the sense of euphoria which emanates from the prisoner.
Yes, they know they are going to jail, but they have realised that prison is the least of their problems.
Atoning for the atrocity is far more important.
I have unexpectedly come face-to-face with men who served many years in jail after confessing their crimes to me.
None of them displayed any animosity. Without exception, they expressed only thanks. They were no longer visited by nightmares or flashbacks to the same extent as they had been prior to their confession.
In a way, these men were the lucky ones. I know many men, too, now in their 40s and 50s who can’t sleep at night. They are haunted by the same horrible images.
As a former detective, I have no sympathy for them. I can only advise them to go to the police and confess. The reality is that the fear of long prison sentences is no longer valid post-Good Friday Agreement. Confessing to their crime is their only hope of returning to some kind of normality.
