A retrial has been ordered in a compensation case taken by a convicted IRA woman, Ms Donna Maguire. The Northern Department of the Environment had appealed against a £13,500 award to Ms Maguire (30) for tripping on a broken footpath in Newry, Co Down in 1985. She claimed that the injury had curtailed her sporting and social activities.
The Court of Appeal in Belfast yesterday ordered a retrial and ruled that the department could call new evidence at the retrial.
The new evidence concerned Ms Maguire's testimony that she tripped while leaving Daisy Hill hospital with her aunt, Ms Mallon, whose child was a patient. However, the court heard that no trace of a Mallon child could be found in the hospital records at the relevant time.
Ms Maguire was sentenced to nine years in prison by a German court in June 1995 for her part in bombing a British army base in Osnabruck in 1989. However, she was released immediately because of the six years she spent in custody awaiting trial.