The family of a Catholic RUC officer whose killing is at the centre of a Police Ombudsman investigation today said they believe security forces and paramilitaries colluded in his killing.
Mr Tom Campbell, whose 49-year-old father, Sergeant Joe Campbell, was shot dead in February 1977 as he locked up the small police station in Cushendall, County Antrim, welcomed Ombudsman Mrs Nuala O'Loan's decision to investigate RUC actions before and after the killing.
Sgt Campbell's family and human rights campaigners believe he was a victim of collusion between members of the security forces and the Ulster Volunteer Force.
"Our family are very happy that the Ombudsman has taken this case on. We think that an impartial investigation is overdue into the circumstances of my father's death," Mr Campbell said today.
He confirmed that his family had passed new information to Mrs O'Loan's team but said it was not appropriate to make the information public. The family had, over a number of years, come to the conclusion that his father was a victim of collusion "at several levels", Mr Campbell added.
He told BBC Radio Ulster that things had come to light which the family did not feel were followed up or investigated at the time of the shooting.
Information compiled by the human rights organisation British Irish Rights Watch, and by the Sunday Peoplenewspaper has been handed to the Ombudsman.
A spokesman for Mrs O'Loan said a preliminary investigation had been carried out on the basis of the information supplied, and was now being extended. "We are now investigating certain aspects of events before and after the murder which relate to possible police misconduct ... We are not, as yet, investigating Sergeant Campbell's murder but only the circumstances surrounding it."
Allegations of collusion between loyalist paramilitaries and the security and intelligence forces operating in Northern Ireland resurfaced last week with BBC TV's Panoramaprogramme alleging information provided by agent Brian Nelson resulted in the deaths of many innocent Catholics.
The BBC's Panoramaprogramme also alleged an RUC officer encouraged two Ulster Freedom Fighters gunmen to kill solicitor Mr Pat Finucane in his north Belfast home in February 1989.
PA