Anthony McIntyre  ✒ It was heartening but not surprising to learn that the Police Ombudsman in the North has upheld a complaint by the journalist Patricia Devlin that there was "a complete failure" on the part of the PSNI to seriously investigate a complaint she had lodged. 

After a loyalist paedophile, thought to have links to the Ulster Drugs Association (UDA), made online threats to rape her baby the Sunday World journalist reported the incident to the PSNI.  

It did not require the Police Ombudsman to describe the threat as repulsive in order to convince anybody. Most, with the seeming exception of the PSNI, were aware just how vile and sinister it was.

The ombudsman also said it was "concerning that police failed to take measures to arrest the suspect at the earliest opportunity". 

Less diplomatically, the PSNI simply did not give one flying fuck that a journalist at the coal face of investigating the most dangerous of thugs, was subject to this type of intimidation / harassment or that her child was threatened.

You're going to the people who are there to protect you and carry out appropriate investigations … I've had sleepless nights, I've had nightmares that no mother should ever have, I felt isolated, I felt hopeless and I felt that no one's been listening to me.

Ms. Devlin's solicitor, Kevin Winters, described the PSNI handling of the matter as one of selective incompetence. If only we could be so certain that incompetence explains it. There has to be in the mix the possibility that the paedophile was working for one of the police services, in the North or across the water, providing information on his fellow gangsters. Keeping him in place rather than protecting mothers and babies from him might have been a priority of the policing agencies. 

Last year Patricia Devlin spoke to TPQ about the harrowing experience. She raised the very real possibility that something other than incompetence might have been a factor.

TPQ: It has been a rough time for you. UDA gangsters have been putting you through the mill with death threats because of your reporting. It is bad enough that a journalist is threatened for doing their job but when the threats extend to undertaking to rape your baby that causes a shudder. While most likely a paedophile within the UDA using the hate that has been orchestrated against you as an opportunity to advance his own fantasies, it is no less sinister for that. I have been around the block in terms of threats and loyalist death attempts, and I find it chilling. While I guess many would see me as good value for it given my own past involvement in the IRA, you are a mother of three children, a journalist doing your job. You are not a member of some rival drug cartel to the UDA, out to steal their profit and muscle in on their turf. What has it been like for you to be hurled into the eye of the storm?

PD: Not a parent on this planet could honestly say they wouldn’t find a rape threat to their child traumatising. The moment I opened up the message, which was sent to my private Facebook account, I felt physically sick. That sickness did not leave for many, many months, and to be honest, it’s still there to some extent. I find it very hard to comprehend how anyone could allow those thoughts to enter their mind, let alone sit down and type them out.

This person actually looked at a picture of me holding my little boy - a newborn - in my arms on my profile before hitting send. That thought still chills me. My grandmother was also mentioned in the message along with what they thought was the location of where she lived. It was signed off ‘Combat 18’, a neo-Nazi terror group with past links to loyalists paramilitaries here. It was a short message but every single word was carefully selected to terrorise and intimidate me and my family. This was someone who was extremely twisted and quite obviously dangerous.

The only chink of light out of it was, the message was sent over social media, where you are never truly anonymous.

As soon as I received it, I contacted the PSNI, with the belief this individual would be tracked down and arrested as a matter of urgency.

They were traced, I know the individual who sent me the message, as the police told me.

But today, 17 months on, he has not even been questioned let alone arrested.

TPQ: Appalling stuff, nothing short of the fiendish outworking of a perverse hatred. One of the more worrying aspects of it is that we instinctively sense that the type of person who could write that is also the type who could follow through on it. That he is still free to pose that threat to you and your child defies common sense. It smells of a protected species working for one of the state agencies. Why else is a vile creature like that not in jail? This is akin to what Mexican drug cartels get up to – they deliberately target those you love to instill terror. Here we have your baby and your grandmother introduced into the strategy of threat, yet nothing from the PSNI. Despite Simon Byrne waxing concern during the week journalist safety is not high on the list of his force’s priorities. Given its unrelenting pursuit of Trevor Birney and Barry McCaffrey, we have to assume that the PSNI regard journalists as the threat.

PD: One of the questions that must be asked of the PSNI is, does this individual have some sort of protection from arrest and prosecution? That is a fair enough question to ask considering the evidence against him and the failure by police to adequately pursue him for questioning. He is someone suspected of previously being involved in paramilitary violence and has been questioned by police at least once on a murder carried out by a loyalist gang. He has a serious criminal record and has not only been on the PSNI’s radar for quite a while, but that of other police forces.

Three months following my complaint to police, he left Northern Ireland and moved to Scotland.

He remained there until late 2020, which was over a year after I made the formal statement to police.

The week I went public on my decision to file a Police Ombudsman complaint on what I believed to be failings in the PSN’s investigation, he disappeared. From my own sources, which I have had to resort to relying on throughout this process instead of the police, I am now aware he is living in mainland Europe. Realistically, I have to come to terms with the fact he may never be questioned or arrested over the threat to rape my son. That is terrifying, not just for me and my family, but for anyone else who crosses his path.

⏩ Follow on Twitter @AnthonyMcIntyre.

Police And The Paedophile

Anthony McIntyre  ✒ It was heartening but not surprising to learn that the Police Ombudsman in the North has upheld a complaint by the journalist Patricia Devlin that there was "a complete failure" on the part of the PSNI to seriously investigate a complaint she had lodged. 

After a loyalist paedophile, thought to have links to the Ulster Drugs Association (UDA), made online threats to rape her baby the Sunday World journalist reported the incident to the PSNI.  

It did not require the Police Ombudsman to describe the threat as repulsive in order to convince anybody. Most, with the seeming exception of the PSNI, were aware just how vile and sinister it was.

The ombudsman also said it was "concerning that police failed to take measures to arrest the suspect at the earliest opportunity". 

Less diplomatically, the PSNI simply did not give one flying fuck that a journalist at the coal face of investigating the most dangerous of thugs, was subject to this type of intimidation / harassment or that her child was threatened.

You're going to the people who are there to protect you and carry out appropriate investigations … I've had sleepless nights, I've had nightmares that no mother should ever have, I felt isolated, I felt hopeless and I felt that no one's been listening to me.

Ms. Devlin's solicitor, Kevin Winters, described the PSNI handling of the matter as one of selective incompetence. If only we could be so certain that incompetence explains it. There has to be in the mix the possibility that the paedophile was working for one of the police services, in the North or across the water, providing information on his fellow gangsters. Keeping him in place rather than protecting mothers and babies from him might have been a priority of the policing agencies. 

Last year Patricia Devlin spoke to TPQ about the harrowing experience. She raised the very real possibility that something other than incompetence might have been a factor.

TPQ: It has been a rough time for you. UDA gangsters have been putting you through the mill with death threats because of your reporting. It is bad enough that a journalist is threatened for doing their job but when the threats extend to undertaking to rape your baby that causes a shudder. While most likely a paedophile within the UDA using the hate that has been orchestrated against you as an opportunity to advance his own fantasies, it is no less sinister for that. I have been around the block in terms of threats and loyalist death attempts, and I find it chilling. While I guess many would see me as good value for it given my own past involvement in the IRA, you are a mother of three children, a journalist doing your job. You are not a member of some rival drug cartel to the UDA, out to steal their profit and muscle in on their turf. What has it been like for you to be hurled into the eye of the storm?

PD: Not a parent on this planet could honestly say they wouldn’t find a rape threat to their child traumatising. The moment I opened up the message, which was sent to my private Facebook account, I felt physically sick. That sickness did not leave for many, many months, and to be honest, it’s still there to some extent. I find it very hard to comprehend how anyone could allow those thoughts to enter their mind, let alone sit down and type them out.

This person actually looked at a picture of me holding my little boy - a newborn - in my arms on my profile before hitting send. That thought still chills me. My grandmother was also mentioned in the message along with what they thought was the location of where she lived. It was signed off ‘Combat 18’, a neo-Nazi terror group with past links to loyalists paramilitaries here. It was a short message but every single word was carefully selected to terrorise and intimidate me and my family. This was someone who was extremely twisted and quite obviously dangerous.

The only chink of light out of it was, the message was sent over social media, where you are never truly anonymous.

As soon as I received it, I contacted the PSNI, with the belief this individual would be tracked down and arrested as a matter of urgency.

They were traced, I know the individual who sent me the message, as the police told me.

But today, 17 months on, he has not even been questioned let alone arrested.

TPQ: Appalling stuff, nothing short of the fiendish outworking of a perverse hatred. One of the more worrying aspects of it is that we instinctively sense that the type of person who could write that is also the type who could follow through on it. That he is still free to pose that threat to you and your child defies common sense. It smells of a protected species working for one of the state agencies. Why else is a vile creature like that not in jail? This is akin to what Mexican drug cartels get up to – they deliberately target those you love to instill terror. Here we have your baby and your grandmother introduced into the strategy of threat, yet nothing from the PSNI. Despite Simon Byrne waxing concern during the week journalist safety is not high on the list of his force’s priorities. Given its unrelenting pursuit of Trevor Birney and Barry McCaffrey, we have to assume that the PSNI regard journalists as the threat.

PD: One of the questions that must be asked of the PSNI is, does this individual have some sort of protection from arrest and prosecution? That is a fair enough question to ask considering the evidence against him and the failure by police to adequately pursue him for questioning. He is someone suspected of previously being involved in paramilitary violence and has been questioned by police at least once on a murder carried out by a loyalist gang. He has a serious criminal record and has not only been on the PSNI’s radar for quite a while, but that of other police forces.

Three months following my complaint to police, he left Northern Ireland and moved to Scotland.

He remained there until late 2020, which was over a year after I made the formal statement to police.

The week I went public on my decision to file a Police Ombudsman complaint on what I believed to be failings in the PSN’s investigation, he disappeared. From my own sources, which I have had to resort to relying on throughout this process instead of the police, I am now aware he is living in mainland Europe. Realistically, I have to come to terms with the fact he may never be questioned or arrested over the threat to rape my son. That is terrifying, not just for me and my family, but for anyone else who crosses his path.

⏩ Follow on Twitter @AnthonyMcIntyre.

14 comments:

  1. A good rope would sort that drug cartel womble bastard out.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Stevie,
      On Matt Teacy's piece about the death of Noah Donohoe you said this.......

      I think even the Branch wouldn't risk their own necks covering up a potential murder of a child to save a tout in a North Belfast drug cartel.

      First think Kincora and fast forward to 1994 and the death and disappearance of Arlene Arkinson

      Ms Arkinson, who also alleged that that Howard had been working as a state agent, called for a public inquiry into his activities in Northern Ireland.

      They have form.....A short while back Alex McCrory wrote a piece called Murder & Secrets about the murder of a young French woman. He opens his piece by saying.....

      "Sophie: A Murder In West Cork, is a three part series that looks at the circumstances surrounding the murder and the subsequent investigation. Efforts to bring the prime suspect, Ian Bailey, to book failed miserably because of a combination of Garda incompetence and alleged corruption......

      If you check out other police forces on this rock you will find police cover ups for sex crimes against kids... Google 'L'affaire Dutroux '..... If you want I could provide other police forces (including the ones who live on the same south Pacific island you live on) covering up the same crimes....Think Saville in the UK.....

      When Kevin Winters said....... There has to be in the mix the possibility that the paedophile was working for one of the police services, in the North or across the water, providing information on his fellow gangsters. Keeping him in place rather than protecting mothers and babies from him might have been a priority of the policing agencies.

      He makes a very strong case..................................

      Delete
    2. Frankie,

      Not sure why you've posted on this thread but while what you have said is historically true, the political landscape has shifted considerably in the last 20 years.

      There's a world of difference between keeping in place a valuable tout within an organization that is actively at war with the state, and one that's touting on the activity of a north Belfast drug cartel. What cop would risk their career or freedom to cover-up a murder of a wean by a cartel just to gain some info when they pretty much know all the in's and out's anyway?

      The cop collusion in this case just doesn't make sense. They are not daft.

      Delete
    3. Frankie - I said it has to be in the mix ... Kevin Winters merely said selective incompetence.
      Steve - the cops aren't daft? A lawyer once said to me that the cops are either incredibly stupid or incredibly smart.
      In this case I don't have any reason to suspect the child was murdered but there is something just not right about the whole thing and it would not surprise me in the slightest if somewhere along the way an agent is in the mix and being covered for. If you look at the New IRA which poses no serious threat to the state - the security services still put a lot of time and energy into their agent running and would in my view as readily cover for them if the need arises. If they fail to cover for them there is a knock on effect on the confidence of other agents or would be agents.
      Have a look also at the bungling ineptitude and dishonesty at the trial of the three republicans in Belfast - would really intelligent people mess up so easily and put so much effort into sustaining it?

      Delete
    4. AM

      There are just so many possibilities when speculating : rather than to protect an informer what if they simply botched the early stages of the investigation and then doubled down on trying to coverup their own shortcomings? Or one of their own caused Noah to fall off his bike? But even those things do not provide the answers -whatever happened did so over too large an area to be organized -and lacks forensic evidence for something untoward to have happened at random and leave no apparent traces? And we can doubt how his body came to be recovered from an unlocked storm drain that ought to have been locked? The case has all the hallmarks of a dastardly murder. Or a case involving a kid who suffered a serious head trauma that the negligence and/or incompetence of others made worse.

      Delete
    5. Christy - any of those possibilities could be in the mix. They might not be protecting an informer but their form in this track inevitably gives rise to suspicion.

      Delete
  2. Not that I would ever come to the cops defence, but how would you prove that? Is it enough just to prove it came from a certain device? I'm ignorant in these matters. Another thing, is there no self policing? You would like to think threatening to rape kids gets you at least a heavy beating in any organisation.

    ReplyDelete
  3. " If you look at the New IRA which poses no serious threat to the state - the security services still put a lot of time and energy into their agent running and would in my view as readily cover for them if the need arises"

    AM this is my point. The "New" IRA has the stated intention of violence against the state and ergo they would protect sources inside it.

    A so called North Belfast drug cartel masquerading as Loyalists are nothing more than petty scumbag criminals, what cop no matter how corrupt would take a chance on protecting one of these animals if they killed a wean, particularly in a high profile case as this one? What could possibly be worth it? Being a tout? They are a dime a dozen in that area. That scenario makes no sense to me.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Steve - my point is: stating an intention to pose a threat to the state and posing a threat to the state often has a wide gulf between them. The drugs gang pose a threat to society and the cops are going to have an interest in monitoring their activities and running agents. Nor do I think we can say a child was murdered or that a loyalist was responsible, just that there is something rotten about the entire incident and in there somewhere is the smell of police malfeasance. It might not amount to anything but people will always want to get to the source of a bad smell and sort it.

      Delete
    2. The malfeasance may well be the perceived indifference at the start, when the cops assumed he'd turn up pretty soon. When it dragged out then they probably shit themselves to cover up their lack of action. I think this is more plausible in my opinion.

      Delete
    3. That could well be so. I would not be dogmatic about my feeling that an agent is being covered for. There is a range of possibilities including the very plausible one you suggest.

      Delete
  4. Replies
    1. Nothing but a drug cartel. As loathe as I am to agree with Sammy Wilson on anything he is right on this one. But what's the pay off for running them as agents? Are some cops getting a cut? This wouldn't surprise me.

      Delete
  5. Same payoff as always - information, control, increased surveillance. Enough reason for them not to prosecute and let the Ulster Drugs Association carry on its business. Cops getting a cut would not explain it. I imagine the problem is institutional

    ReplyDelete