Murphy retrial over Omagh bombing begins

THE TRIAL opened at the Special Criminal Court in Dublin yesterday of Colm Murphy on a charge connected with the Real IRA bomb in Omagh, which killed 29 people, including a woman pregnant with twins, and injured 300 people in 1998.

It is the first trial to take place at the Special Criminal Court’s new location at the €140 million Criminal Courts of Justice complex at Parkgate Street in Dublin.

Mr Murphy pleaded not guilty to conspiring in Dundalk between August 13th and 16th 1998 with another person to cause an explosion likely to endanger life or cause serious injury to property in the State or elsewhere.

The court heard the prosecution is alleging Mr Murphy lent his mobile phone and another mobile phone to a man who used them while transporting the bomb in a stolen Vauxhall Cavalier car from Dundalk to Omagh. The prosecution is claiming calls made from Mr Murphy’s phone from Omagh were consistent with the timing of the bombing.

Prosecuting counsel Tom O’Connell SC said Mr Murphy entered a conspiracy to lend two mobile phones to a person he knew was contemplating carrying out a bombing in Northern Ireland. “There is no evidence that Murphy knew exactly where the explosion was to take place.”

“The explosion to which he lent his aid, was in fact the explosion in Omagh,” he added.

Mr Murphy (57), a building contractor and publican who is a native of Co Armagh, but with an address at Jordan’s Corner, Ravensdale, Co Louth, was freed on bail in 2005 after the Court of Criminal Appeal quashed his conviction.

He was jailed for 14 years by the Special Criminal Court in January 2002 for his alleged role in the Omagh bombing. He was the first person to be convicted in the Republic or Northern Ireland in connection with the Real IRA bombing, the worst atrocity in the history of the Troubles.

But in January 2005 the Court of Criminal Appeal overturned the conviction and ordered a retrial after finding that the court of trial had failed to give proper regard to altered Garda interview notes and that there had been“an invasion of the presumption of innocence” in the judgment on Mr Murphy.

Mr O’Connell said yesterday the court would hear that Mr Murphy’s mobile telephone was active at Banbridge in Co Down when a bomb exploded there on August 1st, 1998, injuring 35 civilians and three police officers.

Mr Murphy was arrested and spent 62 hours in custody and was interviewed on 15 occasions.

During one interview Mr Murphy was asked if he knew he had lent his phone to a man involved with the Real IRA who was moving bombs and Mr Murphy allegedly replied: “Yes I knew it would be used for moving bombs.’’

Earlier defence counsel Michael O’Higgins SC said the defence would be challenging the admissibility of any evidence relating to the Omagh bombing, as Mr Murphy was not charged with the bombing. He also said the defence would be challenging the admissibility of evidence relating to the use of Mr Murphy’s phone in Banbridge on August 1st when a bomb exploded there. Mr O’Higgins said the defence would also be challenging the admissibility of the Garda interviews with Mr Murphy.

The trial continues today.