Brian McKinney was last seen talking to two men in a car near Bearnagh Drive in Andersonstown, Belfast, on the morning of May 25th, 1978. He was 22 and had a history of convictions for minor criminal offences and riotous and disorderly behaviour.
At about the same time his friend John McClory, who was 18, had left for work as a gardener from his home in west Belfast. He, too, had a history of petty crime. Both had run foul of the IRA in Andersonstown. They were suspected of robbing a public house frequented by republicans, an offence for which there was likely to be a serious punishment.
Many other such offenders had been knee-capped or shot in the arms or legs, and sent into exile.
What happened to the two friends is not known. According to rumour, one of the youths had tried to escape and had been shot in the back and died. Another of the IRA gunmen then killed the other youth to ensure he would not be a witness. There was no doubt locally they had been killed by the IRA.
Both had been abducted by the IRA a week before, held in a flat in the Lenadoon estate and tortured. McKinney told his mother Margaret they were held without food for two days and subjected to rough treatment and threatened they would be shot in the legs. McKinney was also told his mother would be beaten up.
Both youths were poorly educated, having left school without qualifications and grown up in west Belfast during a time of frequent street disorder and intense paramilitary activity.
When they failed to reappear, their families began making inquiries from Provisional IRA figures but were fobbed off with lies. They were told the boys had gone to England but both were very close to their families and it was implausible they would not have contacted their mothers. The families eventually accepted they were dead and began painful efforts to try to make the IRA give them details of their graves. Priests at Clonard Monastery, who traditionally act as intermediaries with the IRA, were contacted but failed to get any information from the Provos.
There were constant rumours that the two were buried in fields above Andersonstown which were then being developed into the Colin Glen housing estate. It was suspected their remains were in the foundations of some of the houses, and as late as last December the Northern Ireland Housing Executive was considering excavating local housing sites. Last August, after the plight of the families of the disappeared had been raised in Washington, President Clinton wrote to Mrs McKinney to say everything possible was being done by his administration to try to ensure the graves were identified.
Earlier this year, the IRA eventually set up a special unit to identify the graves. Until the discovery of the human remains at Colgagh yesterday - in the fifth week of searching by gardai - there had been growing scepticism among the families and their friends that the IRA had correctly identified the graves.
There was uncertainty about why the IRA would go to the bother of transporting the two men, alive or dead, more than 60 miles south along roads where they could be stopped by police or the army when they could simply have disposed of the bodies in the wooded slopes of Colin Glen or in bogland above the Black Mountain overlooking west Belfast.
The discovery of the remains yesterday will give added impetus to other searches and renew hopes that the graves are where the IRA has indicated.