The jailing of a man for the beating of Paul McCauley is a reminder that sectarianism still breeds terrible consequences
THE PHOTO on the mantelpiece shows 30-year-old Paul McCauley laughing with friends at a barbecue, a summer garden behind him, a pint of water in his hand. A few hours after it was taken, in Derry, in July 2006, a gang of around 10 young loyalists surged out of the darkness. Paul and two of his friends were tidying up. The gang threw him to the ground, and began with silent efficiency to kick and stamp on his head. He was left in a coma which is likely to end only with his premature death.
Last Friday, in Belfast’s Crown Court, 18-year-old Daryl Proctor was jailed for 12 years for his part in the assault, which also left Paul’s friend, who has muscular dystrophy, with a shattered jaw and bootprints on his face and back. The judge said the motive for the attack was “undoubtedly sectarian”. Paul’s blood had been found on his boot, but Proctor denied involvement until the last moment when he admitted causing grievous bodily harm with intent. He showed no remorse. In fact, a pre-sentencing report said there was a high risk he would re-offend.
Paul’s parents, Jim and Cathy McCauley, were in court. “We were astounded by the jovial mood among Proctor and his circle,” says Jim. “It was as if they had no idea of the seriousness of what had happened.” Proctor kept his sleeves rolled up during the proceedings, revealing the devil tattoo on one of his arms.
Jim, a former head of technology at one of the North’s biggest grammar schools, Thornhill College, has Googled Proctor’s name and found his way into his Bebo site, and those of some of his friends.
“I couldn’t believe my eyes,” Jim says. What he found on these sites was a shocking reminder that the stunted macho culture of loyalist paramilitarism is still potent among certain young Protestants.
One slogan says: “Do your bit to clean up the streets – kill a taig.” There’s a cartoon of a bulldog beating up a terrified cat in a Celtic shirt, with a gable wall mural of King Billy on his white horse in the background. There’s much ado about “Stoner”, the UDA killer and loyalist cult figure, Michael Stone. There’s the Vodka Prayer – “Our Vod which art in litres . . .” There’s a photograph of Proctor and his mates posing in a Derry park with what appears to be a rifle. Proctor’s profile says he is “Scared of – f**k all” and that he is “Happiest when – pissed, stoned, fightin or out with me m8s”.
PROCTOR WASN’T even born when Michael Stone attacked and killed mourners in Milltown Cemetery in 1988. Born in 1991, he is a child of the post-Troubles generation. The loyalist ceasefire, with its expression of “abject and true remorse” was declared in 1994. He was seven when the Good Friday Agreement was signed. He never knew the Derry of bombs and gun battles.
But he is from the Fountain estate, a small Protestant enclave in the now largely Catholic city side of Derry, next to the walls. It’s a poor area and there are plenty with a sense of grievance. Proctor’s Bebo album contains a photo of a mural in the area: “Londonderry loyalists – still under siege.” He was just 15 in July 2006.
Paul McCauley grew up just across the River Foyle, in the modest part of the suburb of Prehen. “This is a mixed area,” says Jim McCauley. “And as a matter of fact, both of us are from mixed backgrounds.” Cathy smiles. “Yes, I’m from good Presbyterian stock, through my father,” she says. “I grew up in a Protestant area and I went to Mass in the morning and Sunday school in the evening.”
Paul was a quiet child. He went to St Columb’s College and some of the friends he was with the night of the attack were the friends he made back then. “He was an avid reader especially of science fiction. He loved astronomy, computers, Star Wars,” says Jim.
He was a civil servant in the Department of Finance in Belfast. “He was probably writing cheques for the people who attacked him,” says Jim. He had just moved into a flat in Belfast’s Fitzroy Avenue. Cathy had bought him a throw, and had searched garden centres for a plant he wanted. He came back to his old room in the family home at weekends. His daughter, who is nine now, lives in Derry, and she was “quite precious to him”, Cathy says. He was in the World Wildlife Fund, and had been a member of the Foyle Search and Rescue Team for several years.
July 26th, 2006, was a lovely, long hot summer’s day. The barbecue was in honour of one of Paul’s friends who was going to Azerbaijan to teach English. The gathering included Northern Irish Catholics, Protestants and atheists as well as a few friends from Poland and Romania. It was held at the back of a house on Chapel Road, a small largely Catholic area in the predominantly Protestant Waterside. The house looks out over the river to the city, and the Fountain area. The bonfire the friends lit would have been visible from there.
It seems Proctor and others were brought in a car across the river. They gathered at the back of the loyalist Irish Street estate, watching and waiting until most of the guests had left. They launched themselves on Paul and his friends at around 3.30am. There was a PSNI jeep parked near the house, and when Paul’s friend raised the alarm, police arrived quickly. An ambulance came soon afterwards, and its crew tried to resuscitate Paul, whose head injuries were catastrophic.
He almost died on his way to the nearby Altnagelvin Hospital, and, after his transfer for emergency surgery to the Royal in Belfast, was given just four days to live.
THIRTY MONTHS later, Jim and Cathy, who have three other adult children, spend five or six hours a day, in shifts, at their son’s bedside in a special unit at the Altnagelvin where they say he gets excellent care.
“When he seems to be alert, we talk to him about the day, and the family. We read to him, newspaper headlines, short stories, poetry. If there is a nature programme on TV we might put it on. We don’t know if we are relating to him as a child, an adolescent or an adult. We don’t know what he retains. We don’t know if he can see.”
Jim pioneered a school course in road safety. Cathy works as a carer with people with severe head injuries. They are realistic. “The doctors say he won’t recover and that his life expectancy is at most 10 to 15 years,” Jim says. Cathy says they used to have hope. “We still do in a way,” she says. “There could be a miracle.” They talk about Paul sometimes in the past tense, sometimes the present.
“We can’t really grieve for him because he isn’t gone, but he’s not really here either,” says Cathy. Jim says visiting him is like visiting a shrine to their lost son. They threw away some of this clothes, but felt guilty, and have kept his room as it was.
“And yet sometimes we get a glimpse of Paul. He knows there is someone there who cares about him. When you hug him his breathing becomes more rapid. There’s nobody else is going to give him a hug, really,” Cathy says.
“We don’t know,” says Jim. “We see signs because we want to,” says Cathy. “The hurtful thing is not knowing if we are in contact,” says Jim.
They felt the sentence handed down to Proctor was “just” but regret that none of the rest of the gang has yet been apprehended. They are disappointed that unionist politicians and clergy haven’t spoken out and made strong calls for those who know what happened that night to tell the PSNI . They were angry when the Secretary of State announced two weeks ago that loyalist paramilitaries were to be given a further year to hand over their guns. They are grateful for the interest the Irish Department of Foreign Affairs has taken in the case.
“I’d like to know if any of the ones who did this have a conscience,” says Cathy. “They seem to live in a different world to ours.”