A man who was shot in the back on Bloody Sunday claimed today he would have been killed had he not been ducking down when hit.
Mr Patrick McDaid told the Saville Inquiry he was running from troops in Derry's Bogside in the shadow of the Rossville Flats when a bullet struck him but that he was unaware of the injury until it was pointed out.
He believed the shot must have come from the far side of the car park where paratroopers had arrived minutes earlier.
However, Mr Edmund Lawson QC, acting for most of the soldiers, raised the possibility he may have been shot from much closer range and a spot where troops allege they saw a "civilian" gunman open fire that day.
Mr McDaid described making a dash across the car park to escape the scene through a gap between two blocks of the flats.
"As I ran I had nothing in my hands. I saw a low wall in front of me which looked as if it might provide me with cover. As I was running I saw the wall and bent down to dive over the wall. I landed on the ground.
"As I hit the ground someone else landed behind me, slightly to my left-hand side. He said to me: 'I think you're shot in the back'," Mr McDaid said.
"I said: 'No, they've missed'. I did not feel as though I had been shot. The man then put his hand on my back and showed me my blood on his hand.
"I panicked. Fear went through me. I did not know how badly I was hit particularly because the wound was on my back and I could not see it. I believe I was hit at the exact time when I bent from upright to dive over the wall."
"I obviously did not see the shot because I did not realise until later that I had been hit. Looking back on it now, from the angle of the shot, it must have come from somewhere over my right shoulder."
However, Mr Lawson showed the inquiry a consultant surgeon's note from the time that Mr McDaid's wound was black-edged with carbon particles, suggesting a fairly close-range discharge - not one from the far side of the car park.
He asked Mr McDaid: "Do you think it is possible that you were in fact shot by somebody who was somewhere near the gap between blocks two and three?"
Mr McDaid replied: "No, I could not say who shot me."
PA