Mgr Denis Faul and I recorded the torture of men in the RUC interrogation centres in the Palace Barracks, Holywood, and in Girdwood Park Barracks, 10 December 1971 – February 1972 in a pamphlet, published in 1972, entitled British Army and Special Branch RUC Brutalities. Among the torture methods used in Girdwood Barracks, Belfast, was the use of electric shocks. Patrick Fitzsimmons, John Moore and William Johnston of Belfast related their experience to me in Armagh Prison. Patrick Fitzsimmons had been a celebrated Irish amateur boxer.
I was arrested on Thursday morning at 4.20am, 13 January 1972, in a house in Duncairn Gardens, Belfast. The soldiers came and arrested me and another fella. We were up the stairs. I had no shoes on. They started beating us. I was kicked down the stairs, beaten with batons. I was thrown into the back of a saracen. I was told to stop shouting or else I would get more beatings. I was handcuffed to the other fella. We were beat in the saracen. I gave them my name there.
We went to Girdwood Barracks. We were kicked into the entrance of it. I had been hit in the groin with a rifle butt when arrested. We were still handcuffed. I was made sit in the room. An SLR was put to my head and I was told I was being taken out and shot. I was made to sit in this hall till an army sergeant came in. He asked which one was Fitzsimmons. I replied. He said, ‘You are just the little twerp I have been looking for the past two months.’ Another fella returned and I was taken away. I was taken down a corridor, three soldiers on each side. They had wooden batons. They beat me as I went down the corridor. We went to the commanding officer. He gave me twenty seconds to give names of my brother and other fellas and where they were staying. When I told them I didn’t know they beat me. They took me back up the corridor again. I was beat on the way up. I was put in the toilet. I was beaten with batons and rifles on the back of the neck and the privates. I was brought back down the corridor again, still being beaten by the batons. I was brought before the commanding officer again. I was asked had I thought where they were. I said I didn’t know. I was beaten again. I was taken out and made stand against the wall. The sergeant replied, ‘You are being taken out to be shot.’ Another officer came along. He showed me a photograph. When I said I recognised the photograph they said I was reprieved. I was then taken out to the back and handed over to the ‘duck squad’, the fellas with black soot on their faces. I was beaten up outside and kicked. They put me in the saracen and kicked me in the saracen as it was taking off. There were four soldiers in the saracen with me. We made a lot of circles. I thought I was still in Girdwood.
I was brought round to the interrogation centre. Then stripped of all personal belongings. I was made sit in the cubicles. I was taken out and questioned by the Special Branch for periods, different lengths of time, sometimes half-an-hour, sometimes one and a half hours. The second last one I was brought into a room. The lights were off in the room. I was made sit in a chair. As I made to sit in the chair it was pulled below me. I fell to the floor and the lights went on again. There were three men there with stockings on their faces. The head man says, ‘if you want to have it easy tell us everything you have done’. When I said I had nothing to tell, I was made stand against the wall, fingers distributed and legs outstretched. I was beaten and kicked in the stomach and privates for about half-an-hour. I was made lie on the floor. My pants and underpants were removed. One put his foot on my throat and the other held my legs. The other one lit matches. He blew them out and then put them to my privates. Then they made a few rude remarks about my wife and made me get up again. They made me stand against the wall again. That was a rest for about fifteen minutes.
Then they took me into another room. They told me not to look around but I saw a man with a green apron and green overalls with a mask like a doctor. He was a big heavy-set man. They made me sit on a chair facing the wall. They blinded my eyes with a cloth. They rubbed my arm with some stuff and I felt a jab in my arm. I felt my head dizzy. Then I thought they were taking my blood pressure for a band was wrapped round my arm. Then I felt an electric shock going through my arm. It got higher and higher and I felt it going through my legs and the rest of my body. I was holding on to the arm of the chair. Another person lifted my arm off the chair. The person who lifted my arm off the chair told me to sit ordinary without holding anything. The shocks went all through my body, down through my feet and all. Then I heard a voice, ‘I think he has had enough’. The other replied, ‘Electrocute the bastard’. The things round my eyes and arm were taken off.
I was told not to look around. I was taken into the same room I got the beatings. Made stand against the wall. Punched in the stomach and then the one punching replied, ‘I have hurted my knuckles on the bastard’. Then they started to kick my stomach. They brought me over an electric fire as I was standing against the wall, fingers outstretched. One says, ‘Are you too warm?’ I never replied. He put it up to the full height. The sweat was running out of me. I was soaking. I said, ‘That’s it. You can take me out and shoot me. I don’t care’. One who said he hurt his knuckles kept on punching me. He was about fifty, a big man, well-made, grey hair. Before this, after he had beaten me and taken the mask off, he said, ‘You know I did a bit of boxing myself’. He punched me four times in the face. I says, ‘I’m down but I would still do you if I was on my own’. I felt a punch on the back of my neck. They threw me out of the room.
A policeman outside linked me into a chair where you sit looking at the wee holes in the wall. When he saw the state I was in, he asked me to go to the toilet and get a drink of water. I came back and was set down on the chair for about two hours. Then a camp bed was brought in, must have been the early hours of Friday morning. I was told to make a camp bed and lie down on it. But a policeman stood over me all night whistling party tunes. He kicked me on the ribs and called me a bastard. I was awake all night. Didn’t sleep, the lights were on, and he was standing over me.
Then I was made get up and sit on the chair and then brought out into another interrogation room. A man in his thirties with a beard was questioning me, more a talk. He said I was a Communist. He told me how many men he killed and he thought nothing of shooting me.
I made a statement after the electric shocks but can’t remember whether I signed it, don’t think I signed anything.
I was examined by five doctors altogether. I was examined by two doctors in Girdwood. One examined me and just went out. Another time after the beatings one examined me in Girdwood. He was worried about my kidney. He made me strip. I was examined by three doctors at Townhall (police station), by my own doctor, Dr Duffy, Duncairn Gardens, by a police doctor, and by the solicitor’s doctor.
In the early hours of Friday morning, about 4am, 21 January 1972, I was arrested. The soldiers came into the house. They said they wanted to search the place. I told them to go ahead. They searched the house and brought down five jackets belonging to me and said they were taking them away with them. They told me to get dressed. As soon as I went on the landing, they read a paper saying they were arresting me under the Special Powers Act. They kicked me downstairs into the car park. They said, for my own protection and the protection of those in the ‘pig’, they would have to blindfold me. They put a blindfold on and turned me round a few times. They brought me over and put me into the ‘pig’. They drove around for about twenty minutes. I thought I was at the Maidstone (prison ship in Belfast harbour for detainees). I thought I smelt sea water. The ‘pig’ stopped and I was brought out and put up against the wall. They left me there for about ten or fifteen minutes. They came back about fifteen minutes later and brought me into a building. They set me down on a chair and took my shoes and socks off.
I was brought into a room, still blindfolded. I was facing a voice talking to me. He asked me what I did with the gun. I said I hadn’t got the gun. I got kicked on the shin. He repeated it. Same answer. I was kicked on the other shin. Same question again. I was tapped on the head with a baton six or seven times, each time getting harder. I said I never used it. One of them said, ‘Bring in the witness’. They took off the blindfold. They brought the witness in. He asked, ‘Is this the man you saw from the building site?’ ‘How many children have you?’ I said, ‘Five’. He said, ‘Did they know that you are getting eight and ten years for burning a bus, and there will be a long time for shooting at my troops’. I said I didn’t do it. He said, ‘Take him away; you know what to do with him’.
They brought me into another room. I was made sit down in the middle of the floor. They put on my shoes and socks. I was blindfolded again. I put them on. I was brought out again. Put into the ‘pig’. I was given a couple of digs in the ribs getting into the ‘pig’. They took me somewhere. I don’t know where. Same thing, ‘What did you do with the gun?’ and all. I said the same thing. Back into the ‘pig’ again. A voice from the front of the saracen said, ‘Take the blindfold off him’.
I was brought to Girdwood. As soon as I was put into Girdwood, I was brought into the back into a small hut, different cubicles, small, chairs. I was made sit there. I didn’t know what time this was at. I sat in the chair, just looking at wall with holes in it. It was near breakfast time; they were coming in with breakfast for other men lying there. I sat there all day.
Just after supper time, a uniformed person comes in and took me to another chalet. I was interrogated there by ‘plain clothes’. I took him to be a detective. He said he knew I fired a rifle that day and said I would have to tell him what I did with the rifle. I said I couldn’t tell him anything, that I was in the house all day, the child was sick and the doctor was coming. Two more came in and asked questions. Then another two or three. There were six altogether, I think. They told me to stand up against the wall, fingertips, feet well back. After five minutes my fingers were getting numb, tired. Again, ‘What did you do with the gun?’ I said I didn’t have it. Same again. The tallest stood directly behind me, tall, black blazer, football badge or something on it, wore glasses, greyish sort of hair. He was standing directly behind me chopping my sides with his two hands. There was a young one with a Scotch accent, a beard, gingerish hair, at my left side, one hitting me and then the other. Another one with two hands on my spine was pushing me towards the floor. One detective, about thirty, was sitting on a chair. He was asking where was the gun. I didn’t have to go through all this here. I just gave the same answer, I didn’t have it. He said, ‘Give him a rest for a while’. About five minutes. Standing against the wall.
They all came round me again and told me to take off my pants. I had a blue jumper on. They took the jumper and shirt off. I was just in vest and underpants and socks. They started the same again, one at the back and front, punching and kicking all the time. One was still punching me from the back. I said I couldn’t help them at all. They put this jumper on me, put it around my head and took me out of the room and marched me next door.
When I walked in there, there were surgeons there, and like an operating table. They had big green cloaks and masks, round hats. They sat me down on a chair beside the table. On the table was a small bottle of stuff, and two syringes with needles, something like dark blue in the small bottle. There were two syringes. I was sitting on a chair. Somebody came from behind and put on a blindfold. Then I heard somebody saying he was going to give me an injection on the arm. He gave me an injection on the right arm, then he tied something round it, then he did something to my fingers, fiddling about with them. Then he says, ‘Are you going to tell us what you did with the gun?’ Then I repeated the same answer, I never had a gun. Then I felt this feeling in my arm, electric shocks, but two given to start off with, not painful, just uncomfortable. Then every time they asked a question, it only kept increasing, got severer and severer. My mouth dried up. I couldn’t even talk to them. They asked, ‘What is the matter?’ I pointed to my throat. I was going to say, ‘I’m going to tell yous’, but I couldn’t talk. They turned it off altogether. I couldn’t even feel my arm. They brought over a plastic cup of water and gave it to me to drink. I said, ‘All right. I’ll tell you what you want to know; I will tell you who fired the rifle’. They took the blindfold off then. One said, ‘Don’t forget this can be put on again’. I told them it was me who fired the rifle, that I was told to go to a certain spot. They let me put on me again.
I was arrested at my girlfriend’s house in Ardoyne, Monday morning about 3am, 24 January 1972. and was taken to Tennent Street Police Station and then brought to Girdwood Barracks. I wasn’t long in the police station and wasn’t touched there.
I was 36 hours in Girdwood Park. They let me sleep there until the next day. I don’t know what time, but an hour after going there I was let go to bed. They questioned me the next day, but later on that night (Monday). They started to interrogate me, insulting me, made me take my boots and trousers off. They stood me against the wall, fingers on the wall, feet as far back as I could. One of them chopping me on the sides from behind. The other was hitting me in the stomach. This went on for about an hour or so. Then they put a coat over my head and brought me into the next room. They took the coat off and put on a blindfold. I saw one beside me, tall, dressed in dark green uniform. I thought he was a doctor. But later I knew it was one of those who interrogated me by the sound of his voice. He was wearing a mask and hat like a doctor, dark green. There was a needle there with purple stuff in it. I thought they were going to give me a truth drug. I don’t think they gave me the needle. I didn’t feel one anyhow. They sat me on a chair. They put a thing on my arm, still blindfold. They gave me electric shocks. I couldn’t stand the pain. Then I admitted charges. After they asked me for a lot more information, about my area. I said I didn’t know anybody.
Then the CID came and took me down and said I would be out of Girdwood. On my own I did not intend to make a statement. I would have done anything to get out of Girdwood Park.
In 1975 complaints began to mount that plain clothes police were ill-treating people detained under emergency laws at Castlereagh RUC Interrogation Centre. The brutality increased towards the end of 1976. Some 1,700 people processed in the centre were charged in 1977. Amnesty International highlighted the ill-treatment in its report of June 1978. Fr Denis Faul and I had also brought the allegations of ill-treatment of arrested persons before the public in a book The Castlereagh File published in 1978. On 2 March 1977 Keith Kyle of the BBC presented a special Tonight programme on interrogation methods in Northern Ireland. He interviewed two men who had been interrogated in Castlereagh, Bernard O’Connor and Michael Lavelle. In our book we published extensive extracts from Bernard O’Connor’s statement to his lawyers and a medical and psychiatric report on him after his interrogation which indicated injury and stress confirming that he had been assaulted while in police custody. Following the European Court of Human Rights at Strasbourg’s pronouncement on 18 January 1978 finding the United Kingdom guilty of violating Article 3 of the European Convention of Human Rights on two counts, Keith Kyle wrote an article in The Listener, 26 January 1978. He wrote, ‘The Castlereagh situation involves, among others, Bernard O’Connor who was interviewed by me on the Tonight programme in March 1977 (The Listener, 10 March 1977). Mr O’Connor, an Enniskillen schoolmaster, made allegations on that programme in great detail that resembled closely the second category of cases in which the court found against Britain. This, and subsequent allegations by others, create the suggestion that the condemned “practice” – which in the usage of the European Human Rights Court means “an accumulation of identical or analogous breaches which are sufficiently numerous and interconnected to amount not merely to isolated incidents or exceptions but to a pattern or system (so that) it is inconceivable that the higher authorities of a state should be, or at least should be entitled to be, unaware of (its) existence” – is continuing today.’
Bernard O’Connor relates in his statement:
On Thursday 20 January 1977, at approximately 5.30 in the morning, I was awakened to the banging of our front door. I jumped out of bed and ran to the window and saw outside a large number of army and RUC personnel. I thought there was something wrong and I wakened my wife. I ran down the stairs to the front door. When I opened the door, a soldier came in. He told me that he was searching the house under the Special Powers Act, or words to that effect. Two or three soldiers came through the door, then followed by a policeman with a large sheet of paper in his hand. He put his hand on my shoulder and asked me was I Bernard O’Connor and I said I was. He said, ‘Well, you, Bernard O’Connor, are being arrested under Section 12 of the Special Powers Act (or words to that effect) for having knowledge of explosives and shooting offences in Enniskillen.’ I asked him was he joking and he said ‘No’. The other policeman said, perhaps I would like to put some clothes on, as I was just in my pyjamas. So I went upstairs. During this time a number of soldiers and some other police had come into the house. I went upstairs in front of the two policemen. They went to the bedroom. Two policemen stood there while I put on my clothes. One of the policemen then asked me did I want to have a wash and shave and I said ‘Yes’. So I went into the bathroom and I cleaned myself up. Then they asked me was I ready to go and I said ‘Yes’. By this time my children had been awakened and were looking over the banisters. I asked the police not to go near one of the rooms where some of the girls were sleeping, or if they did go near the room not to frighten them or disturb them or take them out of the room, but that they could search the room as thoroughly as they wished. They said they would do that. When I got to the bottom of the stairs I met my wife. I kissed her and said I wouldn’t be too long away. The two police then took me away. My wife was annoyed at being left in the house on her own with the soldiers and two police officers (a policeman and a policewoman).
The two police put me into the back of a police car. One sat each side of me in the back seat. There was a third policeman in the car, with the engine going ready to drive me away. While in the car, one of the policemen, to my left, took out a pair of handcuffs and proceeded to handcuff my hands, one across the other. I told him there was no need for that. He said they were instructed to do that. Sitting as I was between two police in the back of a police car, I thought the use of handcuffs in the circumstances to be belittling. The handcuffs were extremely tight. At a later stage I found that the blood had stopped flowing to my hands. By the time I got to Belfast my hands were numb. The police car brought me from my home to Enniskillen RUC station. I wasn’t taken out of the car there. The car was parked in the forecourt of the RUC station. One of them got out of the car and went into the station. We had to wait there a considerable length of time, about three-quarters of an hour I would say. Three or four other police cars came into the police forecourt as well. I gathered that there were other people like myself in those cars. I couldn’t see who they were, or even make out [anyone] at all, because it was completely dark. The police in the car were extremely friendly to me and spoke about motor cars and driving and things of general interest like that. When the policeman who got out of the car came back, half-an-hour later, he said that things were nearly ready to go. I asked him where we were going and he said we were going to Belfast. He waited, talking again with the rest of the policemen about cars, as he seemed interested in that.
We set off from Enniskillen in convoy. I made [it] out to be about four cars in all. We were driven direct from Enniskillen to Castlereagh police station in Belfast. The police on the way did nothing, I could say, harmful to me; in fact they were very friendly to me.
When we arrived at Castlereagh police station, the car was driven up to a small side-door and I was taken out of the car and brought in through the side-gate. When inside the handcuffs were opened and taken off me by the same policeman who had put them on. I was then brought into an office inside of a hut-type building. A sergeant there asked me to take out all personal belongings that I had in my pockets. I had a pound note, a chain and a miraculous medal. The watch was taken off my arm, the ring was taken off my finger and shoe-laces were taken out of my shoes. These were put in a sealed envelope. The reason why I had not anything else in my pockets was that before I left home in Enniskillen I removed all other articles, my diary and personal letters and other items like that and I left them on the table back home. The policeman then filled in a personal form concerning my name, age, date of birth, address, family, number of children, names of children, etc. I was then taken by another policeman and stood up. He frisked me from head to toe to make sure that I had no other possessions.
After that I was taken to a cell, again another hut-type cell block. I was put into cell No. G8 which was quite a comfortable place really. In the cell I had an iron bed, red padded chair, two blankets, two white starched sheets. There was no daylight that one could see from inside the cell. There was a light in the cell, central heating and air ventilation. I was left in the cell for approximately twenty minutes.
I was then taken from the cell by a uniformed member of the RUC and I was brought back to the hut-type buildings that I was first in where my belongings were taken from me. A room in that hut was used for medical inspection and there I met a doctor. He was extremely friendly and helpful and asked me did I want a full examination. I told him ‘No’. He asked me was there anything else I would like to complain about. I said that I had a strong cold in my chest. He asked me had I received treatment for such a cold before. I said that I had received mystecian capsules. He asked me had I ever got Penbritin. I said I had but that they were not much use in the past. He said he would try them again. He counted out twenty-four capsules to be taken two a time four times a day so that the total dose would last for three days and if I wanted to see him again then to ask the police and he would come again. He then filled in his own medical report from appearance that I was one hundred per cent. I signed the report and I was then taken back to my cell.
About twenty minutes later I was then taken from my cell, again by a uniformed member of the RUC. I was brought into another room in the original block. There I was told that I had to get my finger prints taken. I recognised two of the plain-clothed policemen there as being from ... The third I had never seen before. I know one of the men there to have been Detective ... from ... I only know the other plain-clothed man by sight. My finger prints were taken in duplicate, from both hands; went through each finger on two occasions. They did the palms of my hands. They did my hands with my fingers pressed together and my hand open. Having completed that, I was given a spirit substance to clear the ink off my hands. I was then brought to wash them. I was then brought back to the cell, G8. I was photographed in my cell by two men in plain clothes.
I wasn’t very long back in my cell when it was opened again and I was brought again by a uniformed RUC man to be introduced to a plain clothed detective. He was a very tall man ... He had a beige folder under his arm. Behind him was another fairly tall man, very well-built detective wearing a brown suit. He was older than the ‘taller’ man. At no time did this man assault or ill-treat me but he was present while the ‘taller man’ did assault me.
They led me to a block of interview rooms. I was led into room one. In that room there was a table and three chairs. I was told by the taller of the two detectives to stand in front of the table. He looked at me and he said, ‘So you are Bernard O’Connor. Man but you are an insignificant bastard’. He then put me standing on my toes, made me bend my knees and hold my two arms out in front of me. I was told to stay in that position. When my heels touched the ground, I was hit a slap on the face. At a later stage when I had to wipe the sweat from my forehead with my hand, I was also hit a slap on the face for not keeping my hands in the position I was told. Several times I wobbled to my heels and each time I was struck on the face. The ‘tall man’ generally used his right hand to slap the left side of my face. This man proceeded to confront me with various accusations about my life in the past. He was aware of my involvement in the Civil Rights and the People’s Democracy, and in fact aware of many other events that took place in my own environment in Enniskillen which had nothing illegal about them. They both referred to my involvement in the Boy Scouts and to many other activities. The other man in the brown suit also wanted me to admit to taking part in several bombings and shootings in Enniskillen, and also to admit that I was involved in bringing injured people in Enniskillen to hospital in the south. Each time I denied these involvements I was again struck in the face by the ‘tall man’. I went through this type of interrogation for approximately three and a half to four hours. My legs were trembling with the strain. The sweat was running freely down my face onto the ground. The ‘tall man’ said he was leaving the room for a drink of water. The older man in the brown suit told him to bring one for me. He came back with three white beakers full of water. The man in the brown suit handed one to me and told me there was no truth drug in it. I drank half of the beaker of water. The man in the brown suit put my beaker back on the window ledge and marked the letter ‘B’ on the side of it.
At the end of the interrogation I was taken back and put back into my cell. A few minutes later a uniformed policeman came along and gave me lunch which consisted of meat pie, beans and potatoes. I was not in much form of eating. I tried to eat some of the potatoes and things. I took two of the Penbritin tablets and a drink of water and lay down on the bed awaiting the next interview.
About an hour later, I was taken from my cell and brought to interview room five. There I was confronted by two detectives who later classed themselves as CID (Criminal Investigation Department) men. All three told me their names. Two of them I remember as being a Mr ... and a Mr ... The third one I can’t recollect but he had ... They approached the subject in completely different vein to the previous two. They were there, they told me, to help me to make sure that I was treated properly and that I could admit to anything that I had done wrong. They encouraged me to realise that if I had done anything wrong that the best thing to do at that stage would be to tell it, to make an open confession and that an open confession at that stage would maybe even guarantee my release. They told me that in any event, that if I had fringe involvement with terrorists’ activities in Ennniskillen that in the courts they would be extremely lenient on me, firstly because the offences were so long back and, secondly, that the involvement would have been so little anyway that I would get a very small prison sentence. The prison sentence, of course, would be halved because the offences were committed before a certain date, and I would also gain remission, which means that I would be away from my wife and children for a period of two or three years.
They also told me, of course, that, if I didn’t take this course and that I was later on found to be involved in more serious offences, like murder, that there would be nothing else for it but for me to do a prison sentence for approximately thirty-five years; I would not see the outside world in that period, and went on to explain that I should understand what the outside world would be like in thirty-five years, and how I would not be able to adapt myself to a community then.
They then went on quite a religious theme to point out that the Lord looks for his sinners to repent and that this was the time to repent and, if I was willing to confess that I was doing so at the hand of God, that that was the proper thing he wanted me to do and that, if I went to my grave with the offences that the file told them that I had allegedly committed, well then I would have nothing but damnation for the rest of eternity. Again, after four hours of this, it didn’t seem to have any effect, so therefore they brought me back to my cell and there I was brought my tea.
Neither Mr ... nor Mr ..., nor the third man I have just described, physically assaulted me or ill-treated me at any time. My recollection of Mr ... is a man of ... My recollection of Mr ... is a man ... My tea was again something in the line of a fried egg, sausages and beans. I tried to eat as much of the egg as possible and as much of the food as possible because I felt that I needed strength. From the way that the previous two interviews had gone, I felt that they were going to put a terrible strain on me to admit to something that I had nothing to do with.
After tea I was then taken back again to room five. This time the gentlemen there, whom I didn’t know, were very angry at the fact that I hadn’t accepted the help that the previous people had tried to give me, that they were really doing their best for me, and I was flying in the face of help by not accepting what they were doing for me. One got to the stage that he would shout at me several times that he knew I was involved, he knew I was a murderer, he knew I was a terrorist, and he knew I was leading all the terrorists and young boys astray. He felt I was a top man in the Provisional IRA and if so from here on I was going to be cracked. He had about two and a half hours or more at this sort of thing. He was disgusted at the end of his interrogation and he again brought me back to my cell. He told me on my way back that I would rue what I had done. The man who conducted this interview was very similar in description to Mr ... He did not physically assault or ill-treat me at any time.
It was during this interview that I heard at least three other people receiving physical abuse as walls shook and I heard people shouting in the room adjoining the one I was in, in the one opposite the one I was in, and in a room some distance away. People were evidently being bashed against the walls and doors, and receiving other ill-treatment which caused them to cry out and roar. I was told by my interviewer not to pass any remarks as this sort of treatment was not for me. I wasn’t ten minutes back in my room when a policeman again came and took me out again.
There I met a young gentleman and he brought me down to interview room number five again, after signing me out of the cell block. There we met another tallish, six foot, CID man. He was wearing ... Both these ... walked into the room and said, ‘Bernard O’Connor, you have refused to help’. I said, ‘I haven’t been involved in anything’. ‘Well’, they said, their job was to prove that I had been. I said they were wrong and the younger of the two asked me what way did I want to get [it]. I asked him what did he mean, and with that he drew out and he hit me a box in the face. He landed me back in the corner against the wall. I was made again to stand up in the middle of the floor by the younger man and was told that was the way they meant. They then started to ask me again to go over the exact same things that the previous people had gone over throughout the day. I again denied all knowledge of them. Each time I kept getting hit in the head by both of them. One of the detectives, the fella in the ... tried to jump across the table and chairs screaming that he was going to kill me. The other one restrained him. They then decided to take me to room number two, which was a much bigger room.
Again there was a table, three chairs and a litter bin. The door was locked behind me from the inside. I was made to stand on my toes, bend my knees and hold out my hands in front of me, like the position the first interviewers had done, by the younger man. I was made stand in that position for about fifteen minutes. I was slapped on the face several times by the younger man, mainly to the cheeks and ears. My shoes were taken from me and kicked around the room by the older man. Several times the fella in the ..., i.e. the older man, hit me punches in the stomach. They both then took off their coats and their ties and rolled up their sleeves. I was told by the younger man that if I wanted to talk I could sit down on the chair. While I refused to talk, they were going to proceed to make me talk. I was kicked around the room by both men, on the legs and buttocks. I was fired around the room from one to the other. I was punched severely in the stomach several times, mainly by the older man. I was made get down on the floor and do ten press-ups. If I let my body touch the floor, I was kicked by the younger man. I was made do ten press-ups. If my heels left the floor again, I was kicked by the younger man on the buttocks. I was again put back on my toes and made stand again with my hands out. This went on and on and on.
Finally, they decided that it might be even better if I took off my clothes. So I was told to take my trousers off. They then told me to take my underpants off. They then told me to take the rest of my clothes off and I did so, leaving me naked. I was pumped up and down with my head between my knees several times after I was fully clothed again. I was pushed into a corner. The track-suit top which I was wearing was taken off me and put down over my head by the younger man with the arms tied around my neck. I cannot say who tied them around my neck. My nose was closed off with their fingers and my mouth was sealed off with another hand. I couldn’t breathe. During this I heard the older man say, ‘Choke the bastard’. I found even my very stomach trying to come up my throat, until finally I could remember no more for a short stage. I felt I must have fainted for maybe just a minute, or maybe five or ten minutes. I have no idea, but I came round the same two people kicking me in the side. I was made run up and down at the time, jogging and running on the spot. Each time I ran past them they kicked me on the legs and buttocks. They couldn’t get me to run fast enough. The younger fair-haired CID person started to shadow box in front of me. At no time did he hit me in the face with any of his punches until suddenly he would hit me very very hard in the stomach which would land me maybe five or six feet back against the wall with a very loud bang. He also punched me in the clavicle area several times. Again they flung me around the room. At another stage they made me put the clothes back on again. Because I was too slow putting on my clothes, they would kick me on the backs of my legs and buttocks for not being quick enough. The clothes incidentally were soaked, right out to the very jumper I was wearing, with sweat. They were terribly cold going on but, it is a strange feeling, it felt good to cool me down. This took place just before the pumping up and down which I referred to earlier.
Very shortly afterwards, I was made to take off my entire clothes again. In all I was stripped naked on two occasions. On at least three occasions I was kicked for being slow in taking off or putting on my clothes. I was hooded again by the younger man and again choked and tried to be smothered by them both but, except this time, I remember that I definitely didn’t faint out.
There came, around two or three in the morning of 21 January 1977, two other people who had been doing a similar job on another person like myself in another one of the interview rooms, because I could hear the similar banging and shouting and thumping that was going on similar to my own. One of these clients was ... The other client was much smaller. This means there were then four men in the room apart from myself. The tall black-haired man took me and he spun me around above his head. He spun me round several times and then he threw me through the air. I landed on my back on the ground. When he was spinning me he held me straight up above his head and threatened to break my back on the table. I remember seeing a most beautiful shade of violet for at least half a minute. It would seem that length [of time] and was the most beautiful colour I had ever seen. I was then taken by the same dark-haired man and at another stage he hit me a massive box in the stomach which fired me straight across the room without my feet or anything touching the ground until I spattered against the wall.
I was back in the nude again at another stage. They took my underpants which had been severely soiled with sweat and excretion. They were then put above my head and hung down over my face. I was made run around the room while they mocked and jeered at me concerning my private parts, making references to the fact I had seven children, and then left [me] again standing on my toes with my hands out in a very awkward stance again. I never in my life ever sweated as much as I sweated during that period. At a later stage the two clients who had come in last went out and brought back two fish suppers and two drinks of water for the first two interrogators that started the punishment on me.
While they, the first two, sat eating, one of them, the older of them, took the waste paper bin and dumped it down over my head. The litter and paper and cigarette butts went all over the floor. I was made pick up each tiny piece of paper in my hand, one by one, and each cigarette butt had to be picked up in my mouth. If I wasn’t doing it quick enough, again I was getting kicked by both of the first two interviewers. When they were finished their fish supper, one of them, the younger of the two, came over to me with a white plastic beaker of water and asked me did I want a drink. I was extremely thirsty and would have been very delighted to get a drink. I said ‘Yes’. He handed the drink into my hand and with the other hand he smacked it out of my hand and sent it flying over the floor. I was then made get down on the floor on my hands and knees and lick the water off the floor. I was delighted even to get it like that.
Finally at the end of, I would say, five hours or so of this sort of treatment, they threatened to put me into a car and drive me to the top of the Shankhill Road where they would have already informed the UVF, and let me free and that would solve all their problems. It was the first two interviewers said this. (The other two, i.e., the last two, left after bringing the fish suppers but came in from time to time.) They brought me outside to do this, but walking past the hut where the cells were, I was brought in and put into my cell. The parting word from the younger of the first two plain-clothed detectives was that, 1. he would get me himself, and 2. if he didn’t get me, he would drive the car for the other person, i.e. the older detective, to shoot me. That was about four o’clock in the morning of 21 January 1977. All four interviewers last described had frequently used the word ‘fuck’ to me.
I was awakened, and it is wrong to say I was awakened because I had no chance of sleeping that night due to my experience, I was called at seven o’clock in the morning of 21 January 1977 and told that my breakfast was there. My breakfast consisted of an egg on toast and some beans. I tried to eat as much of it as I could, because I knew from the experience I had the more food I could eat the stronger I would be.
I was then taken from my cell by another plain-clothed policeman and brought back to room two for interrogation at ten o’clock in the morning of 21 January 1977. I hardly knew what the time was. I kept asking the uniformed policemen who were taking me out of the cell what time it was, and they always told me. The two CID who were taking me now was 1. a smallish fellow, and 2. a taller fellow. These two clients were inclined again to go through the entire file again, to go through the same stuff all over again. But each time I would say ‘No’, the small fellow put his hand in front of my forehead. With his fist he kept punching me in the back of the head under the base of the skull until his knuckles got too sore to do it any longer. After the first five or six punches I didn’t feel any more. I was numb to punching like that.
I was made continually stare through the window at daylight during this session and I could find my eyes getting very bleary. If I looked around to see the person who was talking to me, I got a box in the face for doing so, as I didn’t obey them when I had to look out through the window. The thinner taller one of the two would keep roaring at the top of his voice. I thought my eardrum would burst open. This would last for fifteen or twenty minutes solid at one time. When the dark-haired one would be tired punching me in the back of the head, and after a slight rest, and again talking through the stuff in the file, he would then stand in front of me and slap my face from left to right with an open hand until his face got white with temper when he wasn’t able to do it any longer. He got so tired hammering me that he left the room and said that he would be back in ten minutes after he got a break. He said he was fatigued and wasn’t able to continue it any longer at that rate but, when he came back, if I wouldn’t admit to any offences by then, he would take me to within an inch of my life.
When he came back he was more reasonable than he had been before he went out. For the rest of the interview, apart from an odd slap in the face and a lot of shouting and roaring at me right into my eardrum, the interview ended after about four hours. During this last interview the taller fair-haired fellow punched me several times in the stomach and poked me along the upper chest with extended rigid fingers. Both of these men told me that they were convinced of my guilt and they would personally, if I was released from there, meaning Castlereagh, assassinate me.
It was during the same interview that a third man came into the room and told me that a friend of mine from Castlederg had been shot dead by the UVF and that the same treatment would be suitable for me. One of the two interviewers asked me did I know anyone in Castlederg and I said I did not. I was then taken back to my cell and I was given lunch.
After lunch I was again taken back to interview room four. Interview room four was a small room similar to the other ones with again three chairs. This time I was allowed to sit down. I was taken during this interview by a man called Inspector ... He told me this was his name, and another more friendly type of person who also told me his name. These men were out to prove that I had been involved in murders in Enniskillen. They spoke from a humane point of view of anybody being involved in a murder and the proper thing to do would be to confess. They tried to emotionally get me to admit that I had taken part in such murders. They said that they knew I wasn’t involved in pulling the actual trigger but that I was far too intelligent for that; that I would be the godfather of the scene and that I would be sending young boys and killers out to do these jobs under my instructions and that they had at long last caught up with this godfather. They showed me photographs of the remains of bodies that were picked up, of people who had been killed in explosions and shootings in Enniskillen. They placed them on my knee and asked me to look at them for ages. I was asked to comment on them. I was asked to comment on the type of feeling I felt of people who would do that sort of thing. I was asked for my political views on the present situation in Northern Ireland. My previous days in the Civil Rights Campaign were thoroughly discussed, my days in the People’s Democracy; even a very petty offence of stealing steeples from a sawmill, a derelict sawmill in Enniskillen, when I was nine years of age, was brought up. They were very conversant with my private life in Enniskillen and had twisted everything round to the fact that I should admit now to murder, because it was only in all honesty and justice, looking at these photographs and that type of thing, that that would be the proper thing to do. Needless to say, as I was completely innocent of the whole affair, I would not admit to anything.
The man who identified himself to me as Inspector ... was .... Neither of these two men physically assaulted or ill-treated me, though I did find their line of questioning mentally disturbing by reason of length of time and repetition. The two different new interrogators kept interrogating me until around two o’clock that morning, 22 January 1977, the following morning, which would have been Saturday morning. I would describe them as 1. ... he was the person who signed me out of the cell block to which I had been returned after the previous interview; up until this I had always been returned after each interview, 2. ... much older man. I would say that neither of these men physically assaulted me or ill-treated me. But, by reason of their line of questioning and repetition and unwillingness to accept my innocence, I found the interview mentally disturbing.
I was put back in my cell then. Again I was in no fit state to sleep, although I felt the cell a relief and a comfort. I was taken from my cell again at ten o’clock on Saturday morning. I was put into room seven. I was kept in room seven from ten o’clock on Saturday morning until five o’clock on Sunday morning, 23 January 1977, which was approximately seventeen hours in the same room. The meals were brought to me there. I was not allowed back to my cell to get my meals. Even during my meals I was continually interrogated, although after lunch Mr ... , whom I have previously referred to, brought me to a toilet and wash-room to let me have a wash.
At one stage another CID man came in, and by the way in this period there would be changes of the CID men about every two or three hours, and they would come in pairs. At one stage one of them came in with a brief case, put it down on the table and said, ‘Right, now I want the statements’. I refused to make the statements. He said if that’s the way I wanted it then he would have to play it his way. He proceeded to open my file and opened it at the page concerning the murder of Constable ... He then proceeded to write down a statement concerning my alleged involvement in the murder of Constable ... He wrote down that I had committed or was involved in a conspiracy to the murder and that I was making the statement freely and not under duress and asked me did I want to sign the statement. I refused to sign the statement. He then turned over a page to the murder of ... and proceeded to write out a similar statement with my alleged involvement in it. He then asked me did I want to sign that statement. After some discussion he then took the two statements again and he handed them over to me and said to me, here write on those statements that I don’t want to sign them. Again I told him I would have nothing to do with writing anything on those statements as I wasn’t involved in them nor did I write them. The writing was on lined paper with the green crest on the top. He then said that he was going to keep those statements and use them in evidence against me in court as statements made voluntarily by me verbally but that I refused to sign them. I told him that if that is the way his conscience worked, well then that was up to him, but that he knew that I had nothing to do with them.
He then went to leave the room and came back and said that he hoped that I was aware of the fact that I would have to do a period like thirty-five years for not co-operating with the police in making the statements. He said in court, if I went in normally into court and made a statement freely and without persuasion, that the police in court would say this and I would get an ordinary life sentence, which would be about fourteen years, which meant that I would be released from prison, or I would get half remission because the offence was committed before a certain date. Not alone that but I would get one-third remission then on the remainder, which meant I would be released within five years. If, however, he was having to get up in court and say I would not co-operate in custody with the police in making these statements, the judge would rule that I would get a life sentence with a stipulated period of (as in the experience of [those convicted for the murders of] the Miami Showband) thirty-five years sentences. He then asked me to understand what the world was like and the changes that came over the past thirty-five years, and how over the next thirty-five years, if I was locked up in prison, when I would come out, I would be in no fit state to meet society. I wouldn’t understand the changes that had taken place and I would, therefore, feel that I could not fit into society. I was asked to think of my wife and family. At one stage he said that the only time you’ll get out of prison would be to attend your mother’s funeral on a day’s remission and, perhaps, maybe if I was good in custody, to get out to my son or daughter’s wedding. Having finally, of course, convinced himself that I was not going to involve myself in these made-up statements, he left the room in expression of disgust.
This man was the same man who had me last thing at 2am that same morning 22 January 1977 and also at 10am that morning, i.e. 22 January 1977, that is, he was the much older man of the two who interviewed me until 2am on 22 January 1977. The younger man who was present at both interviews took notes.
The next person I had was a Mr ... He was a tall CID man. Again he was a quite friendly sort of person. He even offered me cough sweets. He apologised from the point of view that he had a cold and he would just like to have a little talk with me. The talk lasted roughly about four hours. It went on the trend that he was an extremely religious fellow. He quoted several items of scripture from the Bible, all to try and convince me that I should in this point of time, under the eyes of God, admit to the guilt that he said that I was involved in. After his long and interesting at times discussion and lecture on religion, I seemed to disappoint him terrible when I said that ‘No’ I did nothing wrong, I was not involved in the acts of terrorism that they were trying to tell me and that I was sorry that he had got the wrong man in there. He then wanted to know as a result of that who did I think was the right man that should be in there. Again I told him that in no way did I know anything about terrorism in Enniskillen, nor did I want to know anything about terrorism in Enniskillen. I told him I never was involved in the IRA. I told him that I am not involved in the IRA and I never wanted to be involved in the IRA. He told me that was a lie, that he had complete evidence in that file to prove otherwise and, despite everything that he had said and that I had said, he was still one hundred per cent convinced that I was the man they were looking for. Again he left the room and this led up to some time in the region of about 11 o’clock at night. Now I had been in that room all day from 10 o’clock that morning up until then.
The only break that I had received out of that room was a twenty minute break, I’d say sometime in the region of around 5 o’clock and it was to be examined by my own doctor from Enniskillen, Dr ... , whose attendance I had requested the previous day, Friday 21 January 1977, from one of the uniformed sergeants. I was very thoroughly examined by Dr ... in the presence of another young doctor who was there under the direction of the RUC to act as a neutral observer to my medical examination. Dr ... medically examined me from the top of my head to the soles of my feet. He discovered numerous bruise marks and swellings on parts of my body. The other doctor that was there verbally agreed with what Dr ... noticed and then wrote them down on his report as well as Dr ... writing them down on the report he was making.
I was then taken back from that medical examination to my cell and then back to the interview room where I had been and there my interrogation continued. Around 11 o’clock that night, in the same room which I hadn’t got out of, only for that twenty minute period or so, I was then confronted by two very tall well-built CID men. (One) threw his coat on the back of [the] chair, took out two large packets of Stirling cigarettes from [his] overcoat pocket and threw them on the table. He also threw a packet of Opal fruit sweets onto the table as well. He lifted the ash tray from the window ledge, threw it upside down to throw ashes out of it and then put it on the table. He threw the chair from the corner over to the table. He then sat down on a chair and put his feet upon a table. The man ...
Both the men smoked a lot. They offered me sweets which I was very glad to take. It appeared to me that these men were out to ask me as many questions as they possibly could about everything and anything. I was asked questions about religion, priests, nuns, pope, schools, civil rights, P.D., all forms of politics, united Ireland, political parties in the south, England, sex, personal sex life, practically everything one would want to ask questions about. The questions were mainly asked in a very slanted sort of manner. For instance they would ask did I believe that priests had intercourse with young girls; did I believe that priests had intercourse with nuns; did I believe that the nuns were in orphanages to cater for their own children; did I believe that the Pope was a bastard; did I believe that the Pope was the cause of starvation in parts of the world for not selling his wealth and his property. This type of question went on and on and on, roughly to about 4 and 4.30 in the morning of 23 January 1977. At times I was answering ‘yes’ and ‘no’ to things I honestly didn’t believe in and I knew were completely untrue. I know for a fact that when they asked me did I believe the Pope was a bastard, I answered ‘yes’. I know for a fact that I gave a completely unfounded answer in agreeing with them when they said St Christopher was being stroked off as a saint by the pope. I may have let down my religion during this period through sheer fatigue, in not being fit to put my mind or to employ my mind into giving a reasonable and proper answer.
During this period I felt that I could relax my mind that bit to allow that sort of thing to happen but, when it came to approximately 4.30 in the morning, the questions started to come direct from the file and to implicate me in terrorist activities that had taken place in Enniskillen between the years 1972 and 1974. It was at this stage that my mind had to become suddenly alert again and to be very careful of the things I was going to say, because a yes or no in the wrong position at this stage would have incriminated me into something that I have never been involved in. At approximately 5 o’clock on 23 January 1977 I was brought back by these gentlemen to my cell. I had not seen these two men before, nor did I see them again.
On Sunday morning I was called again about 7 o’clock for my breakfast. I ate the entire breakfast to try and again build myself up. I asked the police officer in charge of the cell block to give me a drink of water. He quite willingly gave me as much water to drink as I wanted. He was very helpful. At no stage did these uniform policemen at any time interfere with or ill-treat me, but I could only meet these men when I was put back into my cell.
During interrogation in no way could I have had any contact with any of these uniformed policemen. It was only when they put me back into my cell that I would be able to ask them for a drink of water or my tablets or, as one did later on, get me a towel and soap to take a cold shower. On Sunday morning I had no interrogation whatsoever. I was left in my cell alone without anybody to talk to until about 3 o’clock in the afternoon, Sunday afternoon.
I was again taken out for further interrogation. This time by a Detective Constable ... who I would describe as ... Both these men told me their names. Also Detective Constable ... came into his interview on a few occasions. Again this interview was similarly based on previous ones where they went back to my file and asked me more questions similar to what I had been asked before and right through the whole rigmarole.
Among others who interviewed me on that Sunday, 23 January 1977, both before and after tea, was Detective Sergeant ... who told me his name. He kept expressing disgust at me being involved in the alleged offences and would not hear of my innocence. This was the first and only time I was interviewed by this man. I was also interviewed on this day by the small detective who was one of the latter two detectives who came into room two during the interrogation between 10pm and 4am on my first night in custody 20 January 1977. Incidentally every CID person who interviewed me had to write a report about the interview. My file was thick when it started, but it was now getting to be twice as thick with the extra reports they were putting in. That interview was again based similarly on the ones before, the same questions, the same idea, and again the same result. I was not willing to, in any way, accept blame for anything I had not done.
On Sunday after tea a similar thing happened, similarly taken for interrogation for a similar period of four hours and again it was the exact same thing happened. I was interviewed until approximately 3 o’clock on Monday morning 24 January 1977 and finally put back in my cell. But at no stage during these interviews on Sunday had there been trace or any sign of violence being used on me.
On Monday morning 24 January 1977 I had a shorter than usual interrogation from the two people who had interviewed me on Friday morning 21 January 1977 from 10 o’clock. They were again using the similar approach. Some of their ideas they had used before, except that this time they didn’t attempt to use any violence on me but went through the same type of questioning again.
The next two that I had were the two main CID men who had used the most serious abuse against me on the first night that I was held in custody on that Thursday night early Friday morning, i.e., the first two of four men who saw me after 10pm of 20 January 1977. At this time they did not attempt to abuse me. They were there to give me good advice, and the advice was that I should take a short stretch in jail now or, if I was going to be now released, which they doubted very much, and said that in fact they were sure I wasn’t but, if by any chance I was, that the UVF would only be too delighted to murder me. That was very strange. This reminds me of the first interview I had with them, when they were kicking me around the place, that they said that they personally would make sure that I would be assassinated, and they said that they personally would be the boys who would assassinate me themselves.
This was contrary to the two people I had on Friday morning first from 10 o’clock. Their threat of assassination was that one of them, yes, would personally do it, that is if the UVF didn’t do it first. He would be very surprised if I wasn’t assassinated by the UVF. In the event of them not being able to do it in two or three weeks that he would guarantee that it would be done by themselves within six months. The two interviewers that kept me from 11 o’clock on Saturday night until 5 o’clock on Sunday morning at numerous times said that the UVF would assassinate me because they had no doubt that I was the godfather. However, they felt that in no way were the UVF going to get me because they had cracked the Miami Showband murderers and they would have no bother cracking me too.
I was put back in my cell for my lunch and after lunch at about roughly 3 o’clock I was taken from my cell again. This time I was interviewed by two CID men whom I know. One was Detective ... from ... and the other was a Detective ... from ... Both these men took the attitude that either I was as guilty and as black in guilt as the floor or as white in innocence as the ceiling. It was a light-hearted interview really because I believe that for the first time I met people I knew and who knew me. I wasn’t afraid to talk freely to these men. There were no strong accusations made against me and I sincerely believe that they believed that I was innocent.
I was put back for tea and after tea I then met another member of the CID, this time a new face for the first time, [a] small man. He again decided to go back down through the file asking me the same questions as I had been asked by numerous other CID men before. Again I told him I was innocent. He said I was just telling him the same story as I told the rest, that it was about time now that I told the truth. He was getting quite nasty about the whole thing. He asked me did I think that a good hammering at this stage might help me to tell the truth.
This interview was interrupted by Chief Inspector ... from ... whom I was delighted to see. He asked the other CID man to leave the room. Another gentleman came into the room whom I now know to be Chief Superintendent ... of CID. Mr ... had been one of the men who had come into the room at one of the previous interviews of which I have told you and produced the brief case and wrote out the two made-up statements about the two murders that I refused to sign. Mr ... told me that I was being released and that I had the option of going home with ... or having my wife drive to Belfast to collect me as she had wished. I said that my wife was in no fit state to drive to Belfast and that I would be only too pleased to drive back to Enniskillen with ...
I was then brought back to my cell which incidentally now was G9 because the lock on G8 had failed two days previous. There I took the dirty sheets off the bed and put them into a pillow case. I was given a plastic bag to put my dirty clothes and belongings into. I was then brought before a doctor for a final medical examination. The doctor asked me did I want a full medical examination and I said ‘No’. He filled in the recognised medical form and stated I had received no injuries since Dr ...’s examination, nor was I willing to complain nor had I received nor complained about any injuries received from the previous medical examination by my own doctor. I signed the form stating to that effect, that is, that I had received no injuries since the time I had been examined by Dr ...
I was then taken to the Police Office and there the police sergeant gave me back my belongings that were taken from me the first day I arrived – my watch, my medal and chain, my ring, my pound note and my pair of laces. Also given back to me was a newspaper, two books, a packet of cigarettes, and some bars of chocolate which had been sent into me and which were not allowed to be given to me. I was then given a form to sign by the police sergeant which was stating – had I received any ill-treatment while I was in custody. I signed that part of the form which said that I had received ill-treatment. At the bottom of the form was a section which said ‘other information’. I wrote that I had received injuries in accordance with the medical report already submitted by Dr ... I was given back all my belongings.
Chief Inspector ... drove me to Enniskillen. On the way he spoke about numerous political things that had happened in the past, like the Civil Rights Campaign, the People’s Democracy affairs, the Concern newspaper which used to name him specifically and how he used to enjoy reading about himself, the present political state of Northern Ireland, and in no way did he at any time try to involve himself in any fringe interrogation about any offences back in town that I had been interrogated on during my stay there at Castlereagh. We arrived home at approximately 10.45pm to the delight of everybody.
This statement has been made by me Bernard O’Connor of ... Enniskillen, County Fermanagh, on the 28th day of January 1977, at the offices of my solicitors, Messrs ... & ...
I am 36 years of age this summer. I was born on the 1st June 1942. I have a wife and her name is Mary Patricia O’Connor, formerly Crosby. I have seven children, namely Philip, Nuala, Moira, Sinéad, Brian, Áine, Nollaig. I was married on the 28th day of December 1965 at Holy Rosary Church, Belfast. I am at present employed as a school teacher in ... , Enniskillen. I commenced employment there on the 1st September 1966. I have a post of responsibility for music in the school for the past three years. I am a scout master with St Michael’s unit of the Catholic Boy Scouts of Ireland. I was a founder member of that organisation in Enniskillen in 1961 and I have been a scout master up until 1969. I am now the unit leader of that unit in Enniskillen.
At nine years of age in the year 1951 I was convicted of being involved in the theft of a small quantity of steeples from Acheson’s mill in the Brook. I was involved also and convicted of obstructing the police in the course of their duty at a sit-down in the Civil Rights parade in Enniskillen in 1972. Other than that I have no other criminal convictions whatever of any kind nor have I had any other involvement with the RUC.
Supplement: Statement by Bernard O’Connor, 16 June 1977, on RUC interview based on the Catholic religion.
This interview lasted from 11pm on Saturday 22 January to 5am on Sunday 23 January. Practically two-thirds of this interview was based on the Catholic religion. In previous interviews many of the interrogators would say abusive things about my Catholic religion, but during this particular interview there was a prolonged attack on the Catholic Church. The fact that I teach in a Catholic school and also give religious instruction to the pupils, and the fact that I am Diocesan Commissioner for training scout leaders in the diocese of Clogher for the Catholic Boy Scouts of Ireland made the two interrogators very bitter towards me.
The questions were asked in quick succession, giving little time to think of an answer. The following are an example of the kind of questions that they asked:
Do you believe that the majority of priests have sex lives?
Do you know that nuns and priests have sex together?
Do you know that nuns run orphanages to cater for their own babies?
Do you believe that when we (the interrogators) pulled into a lay-by two nights ago there was a priest in a car having sex with a teenage girl?
Would that priest be able to forgive sin in confession?
If you were lying on the path, would that priest be able to anoint you?
Do you believe that priests should marry?
Do you use contraceptives?
Do you think the Catholic Church has the right to forbid the use of contraceptives?
The Pope forbids the use of contraceptives so that there will be more Catholics in the world than any other religion.
Would you agree that over half of the Catholic parents in the country use the pill?
Wouldn’t the Pope be able to solve the hunger problem in the world if he sold the Vatican and all the valuable properties that the Church owns?
Do you believe in the infallibility of the Pope?
What do you think of the Pope kicking out saints? Do you believe in St Christopher?
Why do I pray to the Virgin Mary?
Why pray to the saints, why not pray directly to the boss?
This kind of questioning went on for hours. When I tried to defend the teachings of the Church, one of the interrogators would stop me by saying the following, ‘Such a stupid answer for a fucking intelligent school teacher’.
They went on to give me the details of their own sex lives and the freedom they enjoy with the pill, etc. Everything they said about the Catholic Church, the Pope and the teachings of the Church was most insulting. They used the most foul language throughout the interview.
Bernard O’Connor, Enniskillen, 18 June 1977
Women were also ill-treated in Castlereagh Interrogation Centre. On 7 November 1977, eight women from the Short Strand area of Belfast were arrested by the RUC under emergency legislation and held in Castlereagh for seventy-two hours. Mgr Denis Faul and I published in The Castlereagh File statements from the Association for Legal Justice on the interrogation of these women.
The Short Strand is a Catholic enclave in east Belfast. In the 1970s and 1970s it was reduced from a population of 8,000 to 2,600, a result of the war in the north and unenlightened redevelopment. It is a district noted for its community spirit and kindly hospitality. Some fifty residents have been killed there in the recent troubles. In December 1997 there were 56 men and women from this little district in prison for political offences.
The first part of the following statement was taken by Elizabeth F. Murray and the second part by me.
On Monday 7 November 1977 at 6.30am I was rapped up. When I got to the door there were four RUC men accompanied by the army and two women officers in plain clothes. They said there going to search. I asked if they had search warrants. They said ‘Yes’. Two RUC men went upstairs. One went into the scullery and the other one stayed in the kitchen along with the two women officers. I stayed downstairs. They all came down again. They didn’t search much when they came down again, only the electric box.
I said I had the baby upstairs. He told me I’d have to leave him with somebody. I didn’t want to leave him and I went up to get him. A woman officer came up as well. The baby was in his pyjamas. I got the bottoms off and struggled to get his underpants and trousers, etc. They then said, ‘We’ll have to go on’. So we had to go with his pyjamas top on. They lifted some of his clothing with him and hustled us outside.
I was put in a jeep with the child. I was taken to Castlereagh. There I was taken to a kitchen in it and left with two women police in plain clothes. A uniformed policewoman came in. She told them to go on, she would stay. A plain clothes man came in, put his hands out and said, ‘Give me the baby’. He said he’d contacted the authorities and they would take the baby to a home. I started crying, saying I wasn’t giving him to any policeman or any welfare. They said, ‘He’s not staying here’. So this RUC man came in. He asked where my husband was and said they’d get in touch with him. I shouted, ‘You know where my husband is’. He laughed and said, ‘Why, where is he?’ I was still crying. I told him he was in jail. He then asked if I was going to hand Ciarán over. I said, ‘No. You can send for his granny’. So they went out to get her and they brought her in to me in Castlereagh. I gave her the baby.
I was taken to a cell. I had to leave my coat and shoes outside the cell door. A man came in to take my finger prints. I was brought down to a room to have them taken. Back to the cell. I couldn’t breathe in this cell because the fan was blowing out hot air and it was making a terrible noise as well. I kept rapping the door and asking for water and, as well, I had diarrhoea, so I needed to get to the toilet. I called, ‘Miss, get me the doctor, get me Dr ...’ The police told me afterwards he was too busy. Then I was photographed twice. I was then taken to the interrogation room.
There were two male interviewers and a policewoman. They said I would know what I was in there for. I said I didn’t. He said did I know what Section 10 was. I said ‘No’. He said, ‘you know under this you are suspected of being a terrorist and being a member of Cumann na mBan’. I said that I was never a member of any organisation. They all started laughing. So they said, what did I know about the fire-bombs. I said that I didn’t know anything. They banged the table. I was scared and I couldn’t stop shaking. They told me they heard I was sick. I told them I never had good health. They said, how could I expect good health with the people I had bombed and killed. I said that I never hurt anyone in my life. I kept on denying it. I was taken back to the cell. A lunch was brought in. I never ate it. I was left there about an hour.
This time I had two different interrogators and a different policewoman: I planted the fire-bombs (they didn’t say where), I ran around with republicans, I was at republican funerals in uniform. I said that the only funeral I was at was that of two friends and I wasn’t in uniform and the only uniform I wore was my school uniform. They said they had lots of photos of me and one was going to bring them down. They kept on insisting they had photos. I knew they had none. Then they said that my husband was awful good, that he even told them he was in the IRA and that I should be like him and tell them everything and get it all off my chest; I would feel better for it. I said that I had nothing to tell; I didn’t know any IRA men, about Cumann na mBan, about fire-bombs. Back to the cell again.
This time again two different interviewers. One an older man, fat and long hair combed back. I’ve seen him at Mountpottinger. The other was a ... There was a policewoman in plain clothes. She had permed hair. She started off asking was I going to co-operate. I said that I told them all I could, I’d told the truth, I wasn’t in anything. I said, ‘I know nothing of fire-bombs’. He asked, ‘Can you fucking read, do you know what that says?’ It was stamped in red. It said, ‘Geraldine Crane, Intelligence Brief’. I said, ‘Yes’. ‘Well, what the fuck do you think that means?’ I said, ‘I don’t know’. ‘Do you think we get paid for nothing?’ I said, ‘No, mister’. He said, ‘We’ve got men watching you every minute of the day. We’re not only talking about recent fire-bombs but things that go back years.’ I told him that I’d nothing to fear because I was in nothing.
The ginger-haired one, when he interrupted, kept referring to Ciarán as a cub. The policewoman then said, ‘Do you know the song “Nobody’s child”? Well, that’s what he will be singing one day’. She kept on referring to Ciarán, saying I wasn’t crying, so I wasn’t worried about him.
The older man said, ‘You sicken me, sitting there shaking. Stand up against the wall’. Where I was standing I was close to, in fact right beside, the policewoman seated on the edge of the table. He stood beside me. The other one at my side. The ginger-haired one stood facing me. The one beside me struck the wall and shouted, ‘Aren’t you fucking in it?’ I said, ‘No’. She said, ‘He said to stand up, not lean against it’ and she pushed me. I had my hands in pockets and she said, ‘Keep them by your side’. I put my hands down. He kept banging and shouting, just missing me every time. When I moved she would shove me back. He shouted at me then for staring at the brick wall rather than at your man’s face. I said that it was ignorant to stare. He banged the wall. He said, ‘Well, I’m staring at him and talking to you and he doesn’t think I’m ignorant’. Your man laughed and said, ‘You’re my friend and I don’t mind you staring, and I’ll be your friend, Geraldine, if you tell us all.’ Back to the cell.
Witnessed: Elizabeth F. Murray
This statement was interrupted by the arrival of the RUC who wished to interview her re her complaint made at Castlereagh. I took the rest of the statement at a later date.
The second day of my stay in Castlereagh started about 5am, when the policewoman turns the light up. You are left there until about 7.30 am, until the breakfast comes in. I couldn’t eat mine. You have your breakfast in your cell, about seven minutes. I asked to get washed and they let me. I was very sick but could not vomit, so I asked for the doctor. They said I could see him when he came. I was still shaking a lot. About 9.30am they opened the door. Two young men were there. I thought it was for interviews but they asked my name and I told them. They asked me was I Raymond Crane’s sister. When I said, ‘No, his wife’, they started to laugh. They told me to stand straight and walk up and down, turn around. Then they said, ‘All right, bastard’. The one who did the talking had a beard. I was very nervous after that and I was glad when the doctor came. I asked the doctor for a medical. I told him that I couldn’t stop shaking and that the Branch men were shouting at me for it. So he called the policewoman to come while he examined me. I was at least eight stone weight when I was arrested, but was only seven stone four pounds when weighed. I told him I was about eight stone before I was arrested. He said it wasn’t possible and was quite angry. He said there was nothing wrong with me except nerves. He put me on three valiums a day. I went back to the cell. Not long afterwards a man brought me down to the interview rooms, as they called them.
There was another man there and a woman. It was the same girl [as] was there on Monday night. She said had I thought it over, what they said last night, and was I going to tell the truth. She started shouting again, ‘You are lying. You planted the fire-bombs. You are in Cumann na mBan, are you?’ I wasn’t and I never planted any fire-bombs, but they kept on about them. They then started about my husband again and said he was in the IRA and I was in it too. They then started about Ciarán, my son. They asked had I a pram. I told them he was out of his pram a month now and he walked. They said he was out of the pram because I was tired putting guns and bombs in it. I said there was nothing in his pram, that he had a buggy when he was young. They laughed at that. They said I put guns and bombs in the buggy. Then they said I didn’t care about my son, I was going to jail for fifteen years. One of the men said he had a son the same age as Ciarán and he wouldn’t like to think he would be left in a home because of his mother. I said, ‘Ciarán’s not going to the home’. They said, ‘Why?’ I said I had done nothing and was quite capable of looking after him. They said, ‘You don’t know what you are saying. You planted the fire-bombs and have to do time for it’. They said my mother had reared her family and had a bad heart and wouldn’t be able for a baby at that age, and Raymond’s mother had a young family and couldn’t take care of another. So I would be as well to tell them and they would make sure I would get a suspended sentence and would only be away for six months and six months was better than fifteen years. They said I could get twenty with the things I had done. I said I never did anything, I couldn’t go to jail for nothing. They said I was hurting nobody but myself, I would be as well to tell them everything. I told them I done nothing, I was being held for nothing. So they were quite angry and started shouting at me, calling me a liar. They then said the woman there was a welfare worker and in the police as well and she could put Ciarán in the home or, if I signed a form she had, that she would get him foster parents. I said I never done anything. But they kept on about Ciarán and about jail. I just sat and cried so they would bring me up. I asked if I had been left in clean clothes. So he asked a man. He said ‘yes’, they were up at my cell.
I saw my sister on the passage. She asked me was I all right. I said ‘Yes’. The man pushed me and told me to shut up and walk on. The woman police constable on duty in the passage gave me my clothes and said I could take a shower later because there was someone in the shower.
The interview finished about one. I had a shower and my dinner, although I could eat very little of it. The policewoman opened the door and said there was another doctor in and would I like to see him. I said ‘Yes’. I went into the doctor and he said my mammy had sent him in along with the solicitor. He told me to stop shaking and crying. He took down notes of what had happened to me and said I was all right. I asked him about my little boy. He said he was all right. I told him to tell my sister I was all right when he saw her. I was brought out and put in the cell. I stayed for another half-hour or more, then brought down to the interview room where there was two men.
They started off again about fire-bombs and Cumann na mBan. They finished that interview about five. I had my supper about 5.45.
I was brought out again about seven to the interview again. It was another two men. So they started again about fire-bombs and Cumann na mBan. I told them what I told the other ones. One brought his chair round and sat facing me. He started to push my chair with his foot. I was holding on to the chair and he asked me what was the matter with me. I said I was going to fall off the chair and would hit my head. He said, ‘Don’t worry, haven’t you clean knickers on’ and pulled my skirt away up and started laughing. Then he asked what was I was doing, out shooting at the Brits. I said I wasn’t. They said I was telling lies because I was arrested with my husband and my sister, the one in Castlereagh. I said I wasn’t lifted with my husband or sister and I was not shooting. They said they had it in black and white, was I calling them liars. I told them my husband was in jail from July and they must be telling lies. They kept on.
I was brought to my cell about 11 o’clock or shortly after that. The policewoman turned the light down. I kept on waking up. They put the light on about 5.30.
I was brought out about 9.30 to the interview room. They said they would keep me for seven days, it was nothing to them. I could hear someone getting shouted at and the table getting banged. He said I would get the same if I didn’t hurry up and tell them all I knew. They then said about the electric shock treatment. They said I would get that if I didn’t hurry up. They brought me to the cell about one o’clock.
I was brought down again about two. Again about fire-bombs. The two went out and came back with a piece of paper and said my friends told them I done the shops. I told them I planted no fire-bombs. They said, if I was threatened to do it, I would get off with my health and the child but I better tell them. The door opened and there was about three men there. One told me to walk up and down. Then he said, ‘That’s her’ and closed the door. The man said, ‘Do you know who that was?’ I said ‘No’. He said it was the police officer who had identified me. They kept on changing about. Then two came in and sat down and said they were charging me anyway. I said I never planted any fire-bombs and I want to see my solicitor. They said I was identified, my friends had said, and the judge would believe the police before he would believe me. They then said they would let me out if I told any man’s name in the IRA. I said I didn’t know anybody. They said they would let me out if I kept my eyes opened and watched the movements of them. They said to let them know and they would pay me well. They said they would put the money in my son’s name and nobody would know. They said they would give me a phone number to ring if I saw anything.
I was brought up to my cell. It was 5.10. The man who brought me up said he would be back to give me the phone number. I had my supper and was just lying there waiting for him to come back but he never. It was the longest night I ever spent. I thought they were just going to charge me or keep me for seven days. Then the policewoman opened the door and said I had to see the doctor because I was being released. I asked the time. She said 5.15 Thursday. About 6.15 she opened the door. I signed the release form. I was brought out to a jeep with two girls already there. We waited for the other two and were brought down the Woodstock. The policeman started to laugh and said, ‘Duck your head’. We were let out at the bottom of it. The Woodstock is a Protestant area. We ran over to our side of the road. It was a terrible experience.
Signed: Geraldine Crane
Witness: Fr Raymond Murray
Prior to the November 1977 sweep on the Short Strand, Belfast, other women had alleged ill-treatment while in custody in Castlereagh Interrogation Centre. Mgr Denis Faul and I included the case of Patricia Moore, Dunmurry, Belfast, aged 18 years, among a number of statements published in The Castlereagh File. It alleges ill-treatment at a military post. This statement was taken by Margaret Gatt of the Association for Legal Justice and was signed by Margaret Moore, Patricia’s mother:
On Wednesday 30 July 1977, I was coming up Castle Street, Belfast, between 3pm and 4pm. I was stopped by a military policewoman. She asked me to open my bag. I had a tape recorder in my bag which was switched on by mistake. She also found a letter in my bag which I had found in a telephone box a few minutes beforehand.
I was then arrested and taken to Grand Central army post. I was put into a cubicle and then taken out and searched in the toilets. After about two hours I was taken in again and asked if I had anything in my pockets. I emptied my pockets and there was a dead match and a piece of tissue in them. I also had a bracelet on my arm which the policewoman dragged off me. She was shouting and yelling at me and saying I was ‘a suspicious bitch’. I did not say a word while this was going on.
I was taken to a room which I took to be a medical room. A young soldier was in the room when I went in. I think he said he represented the medical officer. He asked me about previous illnesses and did I have any scars. Also did I want to be medically examined. I said I had no need to be examined. He asked me to sign a form which I did. He went out but the military policewoman was still there. He came in again and the two of them giggled and laughed about strip searching me. He went out again.
Then a black soldier came in. The military policewoman said, ‘I want her strip searched’. He just walked out. The young soldier came in again and the military policewoman said, ‘She’s gong to be strip searched and you have to leave’. He said something about ‘his luck’. He then left and the black soldier came in again. I was standing facing the wall. The military policewoman came over to me and said, ‘Right, you’re going to be strip searched’. With that the black soldier left again. The military policewoman said, ‘Get your clothes off’. I said, ‘No’. She said, ‘Take them off or I’ll get three or four women to take them off for you’. I said, ‘Go and get them’. She went out for about one minute and came in again with the black soldier. He said, ‘You’d be better to make it easy for yourself’. I said, ‘For what reason should I take off my clothes?’ The military policewoman said, ‘Because you are a suspicious bitch’. I said, ‘I’ve been searched twice before’. She came towards me and grabbed my coat and tried to pull it off me. I resisted and she pushed me and I banged my head off the wall. She lifted her fist and I thought she was going to hit me. I slapped her face and she then hit me on the ear. With this the black soldier came in. She told him that I had hit her and that I wouldn’t take off my clothes.
She left and came back with two other women soldiers. One was a sergeant major. She said to me about ‘making it easier for myself’. I said again that I would not take off my clothes. She asked me again. This time I said I would, if some of them left. I took off my clothes, every stitch. I put my shirt and anorak on very quickly but the military policewoman said, ‘Who gave you permission to get dressed yet?’ With that she grabbed my anorak and a struggle developed. The black soldier must have heard it and came in again. I struggled and kicked like mad but eventually they managed to get me onto the table. They put plastic-like handcuffs on my wrists and on my ankles.
The black soldier was holding my arms and he asked one of the women to hold them so he could search me. He said he could not get at me, so he took the handcuffs off my ankles and he put his finger inside me. I was crying with the pain. They turned me over and he did it again. During this time they were shouting and yelling at me.
When I was getting dressed, this military policewoman kept hitting me on the back with her fist. They questioned me again and said they were going to charge me with assault. I thought I was going to be released then, but instead they took me to Castlereagh where I was kept for twenty-four hours. I was released on Thursday 31 August 1977 at about 8pm.