Anger as cops lose vital forensic evidence
Ciarán Barnes
Andersonstown News
27/11/2006
Crucial forensic evidence proving the innocence of a West Belfast man convicted of possessing a bomb has gone missing from a PSNI station, the Andersonstown News can reveal.
Lawyers acting for Christy Walsh asked for items, including the coffee jar bomb he was convicted of having, to be re-examined as part of his appeal.
However the PSNI is now claiming every exhibit connected to the case has gone missing, prompting an angry response from human rights groups.
British Irish Rights Watch (BIRW), which has taken up Christy’s case, said it was “troubled” by the revelation.
The Lenadoon man was sentenced to 14 years in prison in 1991 for possessing a coffee jar bomb.
Christy was arrested in the early hours of June 5 of that year as he walked through an alley between Kerrykeel Gardens and the Suffolk Road.
He was stopped by a British soldier who claimed in court that when he told Christy to take his hands out of his pockets he did so holding a coffee jar bomb.
This story was backed up by another soldier.
Christy has always denied this version of events, saying that the first he knew of the bomb was when the soldier drew his attention to it, sitting on a nearby wall.
The device had no fingerprints on it, and when Christy was stopped and searched he was not wearing gloves.
The re-examination of the coffee jar bomb is crucial to his appeal. But with the PSNI now claiming it has gone missing Christy has to overcome yet another obstacle to prove his innocence.
BIRW director Jane Winter believes the case against him went wrong from the start.
She said: “He was in the wrong place at the wrong time. The case against him was never strong enough to secure a conviction, so it was bolstered by false testimony and shoddy forensics, as has happened all too often in the Diplock courts.”
Christy has failed in two previous appeals against his conviction despite a judge recognising the forensics against him were “unsafe”, and soldiers withdrawing their statements and admitting to being “coached” before appearing in court.
