TM/149

FIRST OF THE GUILTY GANG
By PAUL CLARKSON and DIARMAID MCDERMOTT

Murphy facing life
Bomb victims taunted
He supplied mobiles
Judge reveals past
A PUB landlord and committed terrorist was last night facing life in prison after being convicted of plotting the Omagh bomb.
Father-of-four Colm Murphy, 49, was found guilty by Dublin's Special Criminal Court of conspiring in the worst single act of killing since the start of the Troubles.
A three-judge panel ruled that property developer Murphy had given two mobile phones used by the Real IRA as they drove a car packed with 500lb of explosives towards Omagh on August 15, 1998.
The blast killed 29 people and two unborn girls. More than 200 people were injured.
The judges, led by Justice Robert Barr ordered Murphy to be held in custody before he is sentenced at 11am on Friday.
For 75 minutes, the judge read the verdict to a packed courthouse.
Mr Justice Barr said Murphy, from Dundalk, Co Louth, gave both his own and an employee's mobile to the Real IRA murder squad.
Murphy's plea that someone else had his phone on the day of the bomb was dismissed as an attempt to "distance yourself from direct involvement in the bomb".
Murphy also faces charges of being a member of the Real IRA.
Mr Justice Barr said: "The accused is a republican terrorist of long standing, having been convicted of a series of offences of this nature in both this state and the United States and having served jail sentences."
Bereaved victims and relatives of the dead broke down in tears as the verdict was delivered.
Murphy, wearing a double-breasted green suit, flinched as Justice Robert Barr read out the judgment.
The judges agreed that Murphy also loaned his mobile phone to terrorists who bombed Banbridge in Co Down weeks before the attack on Omagh, injuring more than 35 people.
The consequences of that bombing meant Murphy would be aware of the potentially devastating impact of helping the same terrorists again, the court found.
The judges accepted that, on the day before the Omagh bombing, Murphy borrowed a mobile phone from his foreman, Terence Morgan, "by way of subterfuge".
Mr Justice Barr said: '"He gave the latter phone and his own mobile phone to one Seamus Daly, a dissident republican terrorist in Dundalk that day."
After the blast, intelligence led police to the home of Murphy where they seized his mobile phone and telephone records. That day, February 21 1999, Murphy was arrested.
Murphy had as many as seven alibis for the day of the outrage. He was in his pub in Dundalk at the time.
But experts from Vodafone, RUC officers and Northern Ireland Office intelligence agents tracked the movements of Murphy's phone on the day of the slaughter.
His own mobile phone, and that of Mr Morgan, were tracked moving from Co Monaghan to Omagh and back again. There were 11 calls to and from Murphy's phone in the area in the afternoon of the atrocity, murphy's phone was used in Omagh 1.57pm and Mr Morgan's mobile was used in the town at 2.09pm, less than an hour before the blast tore through Market Street.
During the 25-day trial the prosecution case suffered a series of setbacks.
Two officers - Liam Donnelly and John Fahy - were ruled to have abdicated evidence against Murphy. An investigation into their actions has now been set up by Gardai.
But the judges decided that other officers in the case had acted with integrity, and there was no reason to doubt their evidence, including the confessions by Murphy. On the penultimate day Mr Morgan - a second cousin of Murphy - withdrew his claim that Murphy had asked to borrow the phone.
He said Garda officers had threatened and pressurised him into making the allegation.
Instead, the phone had simply disappeared from the glove compartment of the building firm van on the Friday before the Omagh bombing, and returned the Monday afterwards, he said.
But the judges concluded that Mr Morgan's demeanour carried "a clear impression of discomfort and untruthfulness" when he gave evidence retracting the allegation against Murphy.
As Murphy was led away from the dock he waved to family members who called out to him. Assistant commissioner Kevin Carty, who headed the manhunt, said the verdict represented a "significant milestone" in the Omagh investigation.
He paid tribute to the families of the dead: "We are acutely aware of the suffering and the pain that these people are enduring and all I can say is we hope that the events here this evening might go some way in assisting with the healing process."
The father of a 12-year-old boy killed in the bomb welcomed the conviction but attacked the Prime Minister's handling of the atrocity.
Victor Barker, whose son James died, said the conviction of Mr Murphy was "an important step forward".
But he added: "Murphy is not,we believe, one of the central figures involved. Murphy is one of many people involved in this atrocity. There are many more others."
"I think as far as Tony Blair's performance is concerned, for this atrocity as opposed to £200 million he is pouring into the Bloody Sunday Inquiry, I am disgusted at what he, is doing."
Murphy's wife Anne rounded the two detectives whose evidence was dismissed as unreliable.
She raged: "What is the charge for perjury in this state? We have 19th century law and it is 2001 now."