Ardoyne families fighting for justice 23 years on from SAS ambush

Ardoyne families fighting for justice 23 years on from SAS ambush
Anthony Neeson speaks to three families about their quest for justice

When the families of murdered IRA men Dinny Brown, Jackie Mailey and Jim Mulvenna went to identify their bodies, each was shown the other two's riddled corps by the RUC before the body of their loved one.

Dinny's family were shown the bodies of Jackie and Jim first, after both had already been identified. When Jim's grieving partner asked why his body was soaking wet, a sniggering RUC man replied, "you'd be wet if you'd been lying out all night."

Twenty-two years on from their murder on June 21 1978, the families of the three Ardoyne men are demanding that the British Government admit finally that hey were cut down in cold blood and that the SAS and RUC, who were lying in wait, knew that they were unarmed and could easily have been arrested.

On the night they were killed the three lifelong friends walked unwittingly into an SAS trap when they entered an unoccupied post office depot on the Ballysillan Road with a number of unprimed incendiaries. The three IRA men were met with a hail of machinegun fire, while a fourth member in a nearby getaway car made good his escape. William Hanna, a Protestant, who was walking in the vicinity with a friend, was also targeted in the kill-zone and was shot dead.

Six months ago the families of the three men succeeded in finally getting the papers from the inquests into their murder. It was while reading through the documents that they finally decided it was time to get to the bottom of just what happened on that night in June.

"We never realised what they went through until we read the inquest papers," explains Geraldine Keenan, sister of Dinny Brown. "We knew they were riddled, but when you actually sit down and read about what they actually did to someone belonging to you we were in shock.

"They were shown no mercy whatsoever. The three of them were unarmed, one was carrying unprimed incendiaries. The post office was unoccupied so there was no threat to life and they could have been arrested. In the inquest papers it said that the SAS went over to two of them, and they were still moving on the ground - this is after having been initially shot - and they finished two of them off. If that's not murder, what is?"

The statement given by Mr Hanna's companion that night also casts doubts over the official version, which was that the men had been challenged. There is also a suspicion that the three realised that they had walked into a trap and, as they were unarmed, were in the process of surrendering when the shooting started.

Dinny Brown was 28 and married with three children; Jackie Mailey was 31 and married with three children; Jim Mulvenna was 28 and lived with his partner and child.

Six years earlier, and not far from where he was eventually murdered, Jim Mulvenna had been shot 13 times in a gun battle. Although in great pain from his wounds, he rejoined his local IRA unit when he was released from Long Kesh four years later. According to his sister, Mena Baker, the three men were inseparable and their deaths were a big blow not only to the Republican Movement, but to the tight-knit communities of Ardoyne and the Bone as well.

"The three families were close and it hit every one of us," Mena recalls. "Everybody knew them. When you saw one, you saw the other two, and everyone in Ardoyne was shattered when the news came through that they had been murdered. There was just disbelief. It was a body blow for the IRA at the time, there was no doubt about that, and it took the IRA a long time to recover from the loss of three good men.
"To this day the RUC have never come to any of us to tell us what happened. Instead, they treated us with a contempt which was never better illustrated than when we had to go to identify the bodies."
Amazingly, 171 bullets were fired by the SAS and RUC that night. As far as the families of the three men are concerned there was no intention to arrest anyone. It is believed that the three pals were betrayed and the informer would have been known that they were unarmed. William Hanna was killed because the SAS either mistook him for the fourth IRA man, or they simply didn't care who got in the way of their ultimate objective.

The thought of that degree of force being used on three unarmed men and William Hanna numbs the families to this day.

"To justify murdering Dinny, Jackie and Jim the way they did, they tried to pin the La Mon killings on them, which had taken place a few months earlier. But the inquest is full of lies and contradictions and it was just another attempt to slur their names. As well as being comrades they were also the best of friends who had grown up together."

Last month the families ran a fundraiser in the Crumlin Star for their campaign. They were delighted and astounded in equal measure to see the amount of people who turned up from all over Ireland to back their call for the truth to heard - and to pay tribute to Dinny, Jackie and Jim.

On Saturday night the campaign will hold another event in the Ardoyne Working Men's Club and another large crowd is expected.

Amidst the pain and suffering, there is an unspoken comfort for the three families in the fact that the three young friends died as they had lived - side by side. The wonderful support offered up to this justice campaign means that the bereaved families of Dinny, Jackie and Jim aren't alone either.