A man who confessed to a 30- year-old sectarian murder has ben acquitted of the killing.
Mr Justice Morgan told Belfast Crown Court that he could not be satisfied beyond reasonable doubt that Peter McAuley murdered catholic shopkeeper Brendan Doran in 1975. He could not be satisfied about the "truthfulness and reliability of the admissions" Mr McAuley made to police in 2004.
Mr McAuley, no fixed abode, confessed to the murder of Mr Doran, and other attempted murders with which he was not charged, while in an English prison facing charges of burglary.
Mr Doran was shot at the Cregagh Road newsagents where he worked in September 1975. During the non-jury trial in June, Mr McAuley had said he had made the confessions because he believed he would be sent to Northern Ireland, would serve some time on remand before being released under the Belfast Agreement and that the charges in England would "disappear".
Mr Justice Morgan said Mr McAuley was "manipulative" and that he had "played the Troubles card in order to avoid a custodial sentence".
It was probable he believed he could "achieve some advantage from being dealt with in respect of older terrorist offences rather than having to face up to the English offences.
"It may be that this accused was involved in the murder of Brendan Doran" but he could not be satisfied on the available evidence. The "kindest" thing that could be said about him was "that if he has falsely suggested that he committed this murder, then he has put Mr Doran's grieving relatives through yet further suffering and distress.
"On any view he is a truly despicable human being."