Three alleged ‘Real IRA’ men were today given lengthy jail sentences at Belfast Crown Court after being caught red-handed on a bombing mission in Co Fermanagh by undercover British soldiers.
The court heard the men had been infiltrated and monitored while they transported a Mark 15 "barrack buster" mortar bomb containing 100 kilos (220lbs) of home-made explosives across the border near the day before Remembrance Sunday in November 2000.
The men, who all pleaded guilty, gave clenched-fist salutes and waved to relatives as they were led from the dock to begin their sentences.
Sean Maurice Gilleece, 27, from Kinawley, Co Fermanagh, and John Francis Swift, 37, of Galloon Gardens, Newtownbutler, Co Fermanagh, were each jailed for 13 years.
John James Connolly, 26, from Drumboghanagh Road, Newtownbutler, was jailed for 14 years. The court heard he had a 1995 conviction for membership of an illegal organisation.
On the evening of November 11th, 2000 a military patrol on observation duties close to Teemore Crossroads on the main cross-border Enniskillen to Dublin road observed a convoy of two cars and a van travelling unusually close together and turning into an area in front of a barn close to the crossroads, the court heard.
A number of residents in the area approached the scene and as they did so a police car with four officers on board arrived and arrested Swift and Gilleece. Connolly ran off chased by an officer who fired shots in the air. He was arrested soon afterwards when found sheltering in a ditch.
He said the men made various excuses to explain their presence in the area but were all charged with possession of the mortar bomb with intent to endanger life.
Traces of explosives were found on the men's clothing or fibres from their clothing and gloves were discovered in the van containing the bomb, he said. The van had had a hole cut in its roof.
When the men's trial began on Wednesday Gilleece and Connolly pleaded guilty and following a short adjournment counsel for Swift said he was also pleading guilty.
The judge, Mr Justice McLaughlin, in passing sentence, said he had taken into consideration the guilty pleas and the fact that "special forces have not had to be scrutinised in public unnecessarily".
He said he was giving the men the full discount permissible but "the sheer recklessness of your actions and maliciousness exhibited mean that long sentences must be imposed".