A man whose wallet, ring and watch were allegedly taken by soldiers on Bloody Sunday was repeatedly questioned about the IRA when he confirmed that, 18 years later, he had been convicted on an arms offence in the US.
Mr Joseph McColgan, who denied he was ever a member of the IRA, disputed the relevance of questions about his 1990 conviction for conspiring to attempt to receive and export a Stinger missile without a licence. "I am here to discuss what happened in 1972 when the paratroopers murdered people in Derry," he said at the inquiry hearing yesterday.
Mr McColgan also confirmed, in reply to Mr Christopher Clarke, counsel to the tribunal, that he had married a sister of Mr Martin McGuinness in 1973, but he again queried the relevance of these questions to the events of Bloody Sunday.
Counsel said these questions might be relevant because Mr McGuinness was commonly reputed to have been a leading member of the IRA on Bloody Sunday.
Mr McColgan said he knew nothing about the Provisional IRA on January 30th, 1972; he was not aware Mr McGuinness was a member of the IRA then; and he did not know what the orders of the Provisionals were in Derry on that day.
The witness earlier gave evidence that he was held at gunpoint by paratroopers when he returned to Derry after finishing an 8 a.m. to 4 p.m. shift at the Du Pont factory, seven miles from the city, on Bloody Sunday. Guarded by two soldiers who were drinking beer, he was taken with others in a lorry to the Fort George army base, where he had to "run the gauntlet" through two lines of soldiers who struck the prisoners with sticks and batons.
He described various incidents in a building where up to 100 prisoners were held. When a paratrooper found that one man had a republican tattoo on his arm, he took out a dagger and told him he was going to cut out the tattoo for a souvenir. The witness said: "I think the man fainted at this point."
Mr McColgan said a paratrooper brought him to a policeman and said he had been throwing stones at the British army in the Rossville Flats car park at about 3.30 p.m. He was given no opportunity to tell the policeman he had been at work until 4 p.m.
When he tried to tell the policeman that his property was stolen by the soldiers, the policeman replied it had nothing to do with him. He was released later that evening. The witness said police returned his wallet and watch a few days after Bloody Sunday, but his ring and cash amounting to about £30 or £40 were missing. He told Mr Clarke he chose not to take the matter further because "it was not going anywhere".
When asked if it was correct that he was convicted in the US in 1990 of attempting to smuggle arms in the form of rocket launchers into Ireland, and that he was sentenced to four years' imprisonment, the witness said that, technically, counsel was wrong. "I was convicted of something in America . . . but I am not getting into it. That was in 1990 - I am here to talk about Bloody Sunday."
In reply to further questions, he agreed the conviction related to an attempt to buy a Stinger missile, and said he had been entrapped in America. When Mr Clarke suggested the Stinger missile was presumably for the IRA, the witness said he did not know. He further denied he had been a member of the IRA or had been involved in assisting the IRA to obtain arms.
Asked if he had been involved in assisting the IRA to obtain the Stinger missile, the witness said he had been brutalised on Bloody Sunday. In reply to Mr Edmund Lawson QC, for a number of soldiers, the witness denied he was a weapons expert or a former prisoner before 1990, as had been suggested, counsel said, in a book entitled Bandit Country.
Counsel to the tribunal later said he had been technically incorrect in relation to the 1990 charges. The actual charges were one of attempting to receive a Stinger missile and, secondly, of conspiring to attempt to receive and export such a missile without a licence.