A FORMER IRA member, who escaped from the Maze Prison in 1983 and who is now fighting efforts to deport him from the United States, yesterday told a Texas court that he would be attacked if he was sent back to Ireland.
Pól Brennan (55), was arrested by border guards in south Texas in January and has been in detention there since and state authorities now want to deport him - but to the Republic, and not Northern Ireland.
Brennan spent seven years from 1993 fighting British government efforts to extradite him after he was arrested following his application for a passport under a false name. The British abandoned the case in 2000 citing the Belfast Agreement.
In the court hearing in Raymondville, Texas, Brennan admitted that he had been transporting explosives when he was arrested in Northern Ireland in 1976, and he admitted that he had "supported the IRA morally and sometimes actively".
Brennan is one of 15 former IRA members in legal limbo in the US.
Even though he entered the country illegally, he has been able to renew his work permits, but not been able to get permanent immigration status.
When stopped in Texas in January border guards noticed that his work permit had expired, and that he had applied for but not received an annual renewal.
They arrested him after running a background check on his name.
He was denied bail after a judge learned that Brennan had been convicted for involvement in a scuffle with a builder that Brennan said owed him money, and falsely applied for a passport.
Brennan asked US immigration judge William Peterson that he should be granted political asylum, or, at least, permanent immigration status allowing him to remain in the country because of the risk he claims he faces if he was forcibly returned to Ireland by US authorities.