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UNREPORTED IRISH CASES
F
Former Prisoner gets £300 in Test Case for
Ill-Treatment
A Northern Ireland judge ruled that men were detained
in "primitive circumstances", which were "deliberate,
unlawful and harsh", following their arrests by security
forces during the big internment scoop on August 9th
last year.
Judge Rory Conaghan was giving his reserved judg-
ment at Lurgan County Court in a civil action brought
by a former detainee, William John Moore, of Bleary,
Portadown, against Mr. Graham Shillington, Chief
Constable of the R.U.C., and the British Ministry of
Defence for alleged wrongful arrest and assault.
Mr. Moore was awarded the total damages he had
claimed, £300, which is the highest amount a County
Court judge can award. The hearing of the action, at
Armagh County Court in January lasted seven days.
Mr. Moore was released from the prison ship Maidstone
after 13 days' detention.
In his lengthy judgment which took 47 minutes to
deliver, Judge Conaghan said three British Army
witnesses had lied in their evidence about how the
physical exercises which detainees were forced to under-
go had started. He referred to "a deafening silence"
from the R.U.C. and the higher ranks of the army
about what went on in the detention huts at Bally-
kinlar army camp. Authority for the rigid discipline and
regimentation at both places must have come from top-
ranking officers.
Judge Conaghan also suggested that an. Army doctor
"shut his eyes" to what was happening to the detainees
and said that a military police officer in charge of 89
detainees "abandoned responsibility" for them to his
N.C.O.s.
Test case—plaintiff absent for fear of arrest
The action is regarded as a test case and it is likely
that similar actions may be initiated by other detainees
and internees.
When the action was heard in Armagh, Mr. Moore,
who is married and has two children, did not attend.
He has been living in the South for several months
and did not come to the hearing because the police
and army refused to give an undertaking that if he did
come North he would not be arrested. At a preliminary
hearing the defendants' counsel informed the judge that
the security forces wanted to interview Mr. Moore and
that if he came within the jurisdiction he would be
arrested for interrogation.
Judge Conaghan said that the points at issue were—
was the plaintiff unlawfully arrested in. the early hours
of August 9th, and was he treated afterwards in such
a manner as to give rise to an action for assault,
trespass to or battery of his person against the defen-
dants or either of them by reasons of the acts of their
servants and agents in the course of their employment?
After considering the evidence of arrest, and the
authorisation for it, he held that the original arrest was
wrongful and that the plaintiff was entitled to damages.
Mr. Moore should have been informed, at least, that
he was being detained for interrogation for a period of
48 hours and if he was going to be charged with an
offence, then he should have been told with what
offeree he was going to be charged. Thus the family
would have known what situation he had to meet and
they would have known what to tell a solicitor.
It was a pure technicality which should never have
occurred, but one upon which the plaintiff could rely,
the judge said.
At the start of his outline of what happened after
Mr. Moore's arrest, Judge Conaghan said there was one
contradiction which remained unexplained. It was
agreed that ten soldiers in three vehicles came to the
plaintiff's home. However, Mr. Moore said the army
burst open the lock on his front door at 4 a.m., came
into his home and arrested him. The military version
was that the plaintiff had opened the door for them
some time after 4.30 a.m. in response to their knocking.
"The dispute matters little in the final analysis, but
the curious circumstance is that, although the arrest
report records the arrest as 04.35 hours, the records
at Ballykinlar show it is 4 a.m.", Judge Conaghan said.
Ill-treatment at Lurgan and Ballykinlar
There was undisputed evidence from both sides as
to what happened in the converted factory at Pine-
hurst, near Lurgan, where Moore said others were first
taken. Each person arrested had to sit on a chair facing
a wall and the rule was—no talking, looking around,
smoking or sleeping. "A soldier stationed behind each
man enforced the rule, and where necessary nudged or
poked the arrested with a truncheon or struck the chair
to secure compliance. Nobody was allowed to nod."
At the Ballykinlar holding centre, where the men
were taken at about 10 a.m. on August 9th, they were
put into reception huts some of which were denuded of
all furnishings, racks, presses and stools, and the same
strict rules were applied as at Pinehurst. "The doors of
the huts were dirty, and nails and screws had been left
on the floor at points where they had fallen, if indeed
any were removed." Custody of the 89 arrested men
was entrusted to Lieutenant Ian Roger Barton of the
Royal Military Police, with the assistance of Sergeant
Smith and Sergeant Love and their separate platoons,
each of about 15 men.
Judge Conaghan said the M.P.s admitted that
exercises, or as they preferred to call them, "changes of
position" went on in the huts, yet Superintendent MagiU
of the R.U.C. said that he saw none and heard no
commands being given. He did not appear to have had
much contact with the huts, the Judge said.
The exercise went on until midnight on August 9th
and were resumed in some fashion at about 3 a.m. and
continued on Tuesday except in the hut reserved for
people who were to be released.
Judge Conaghan quoted the Compton Report as say-
ing : "compulsory exercises must have caused hardship
to some, at least, of those who were made to do them,
especially those in poor physical condition, and we have
noticed as a particular,, hardship that some men were
woken up to do them in order to secure uniformity of
action in the hut."
Judge Conaghan commented : "The evidence before
me also warrants such a finding."
Particulars of brutality inflicted
Moore and his witnesses had given evidence that
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