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Murders involving British army’s IRA double agent Stakeknife could have been stopped, inquiry set to report

Families ‘greatly annoyed’ that they will not be told whether relatives were in fact informers

Freddie Scappaticci in 2003. The senior Belfast IRA member has been widely identified as the double agent known as Stakeknife. Interim findings of report on his activities will be unveiled in Belfast on Friday. Photograph: Pacemaker

Seanín Graham
Fri Mar 8 2024 - 06:00

A long-awaited inquiry into the activities of the British army’s top IRA agent during the Troubles is expected to find on Friday that interventions could have been made to save multiple lives.

The Irish Times is aware that at least one family was informed by the Operation Kenova investigation team earlier this week that their loved one’s murder was preventable, had State forces acted on intelligence.

Costing £40 million (€47 million), the independent report on the high-ranking double agent Stakeknife was ordered eight years ago and its interim findings will be unveiled in a Belfast hotel on Friday morning.

Freddie Scappaticci, the senior Belfast IRA member widely identified as Stakeknife and who is connected to 18 murders, will not be named in the report due to a UK government policy of “neither confirm nor deny” (NCND) relating to sensitive intelligence issues.

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The former Belfast bricklayer, regarded as the “golden egg” of British military intelligence during the North’s 30-year conflict, always denied he was the mole right up until his death last year.

It emerged on Thursday night that families of murder victims who co-operated with the Kenova team will not learn whether their relatives did in fact work as informers for the security services – a claim that led to them being targeted – as a result of the long-standing NCND policy.

Belfast solicitor Kevin Winters of KRW, who represents many of the families, said those affected were “greatly annoyed” at the development.

“The report is likely to ‘neither confirm nor deny’ whether or not the deceased person was an informant or ‘tout’. For many, that’s hugely distressing and is more upsetting than Freddie Scappaticci not being named,” he said.

“One of the families I spoke to earlier this week said the sole reason they engaged with Kenova was to try to find that particular issue out – they wanted to know if their family member was or wasn’t an informer.”

Mr Winters said he will be calling for the policy to be lifted.

He added that if the report can prove that most of deaths examined could have been prevented, then that will be a “successful report”.

Cases have come to light in recent decades indicating some of those “executed” by members of the IRA’s internal security unit (ISU) or so-called nutting squad, overseen by Scappaticci, were not informers at all.

A woman whose 34-year-old mother was abducted and murdered by the IRA a fortnight before the 1994 ceasefire, praised the Kenova investigators for their “victims first” approach.

Shauna Moreland was 10 years old when her mother Caroline, was held by the IRA for 15 days before being shot and her body left in a remote area near Roslea, Co Fermanagh. She left behind three children.

“We have been failed by the system since 1994 and it was only when our cases were moved outside Northern Ireland that we got a process we could believe in,” she said.

“They were nothing but respectful right the way through the investigation. There was nothing until Kenova gave what my mother deserved. They showed that my mum mattered and she was not just a statistic.

“And for doing that I cannot thank Jon Boutcher [the former head of Kenova] and his team enough”.

The role of Stakeknife’s British army handlers – MI5, and the former Royal Ulster Constabulary (RUC) – in relation to the abduction, torture and murders of some victims is also part of the investigation’s remit.

The North’s Public Prosecution Service (PPS) announced last week that no one is to face charges in relation to offences referred by Operation Kenova due to “insufficient evidence”.

Iain Livingstone, who oversees Operation Kenova, has said victims remain “our absolute focus”.

Members of his team have met families throughout this week and individual reports about their loved ones will be given within coming months.

The Kenova investigation headed for seven years by Mr Boutcher, now chief constable of the Police Service of Northern Ireland (PSNI), until he took up his new job last year. He is expected to be present on Friday.

Seanín Graham

Seanín Graham

Seanín Graham is Northern Correspondent of The Irish Times

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