Still no justice for Captain Nairac: 60-year-old man cleared of murdering British Army officer during the Troubles

By Daily Mail Reporter
Updated: 11:34 EST, 1 April 2011

A man has been cleared today of murdering undercover British Army soldier in Northern Ireland 33 years ago.

Kevin Crilly, 60, from South Armagh, Northern Ireland, had denied murdering Grenadier Guardsman Captain Robert Nairac in May 1977.

In one of the most infamous killings of the Troubles, Captain Nairac was abducted from a bar in Drumintee near the border with the Irish Republic before being shot dead.

Following the murder, Crilly went to the U.S. for 27 years, using his birth name, Declan Power.

The prosecution claimed that, following the kidnapping of Capt Nairac from the Three Steps Inn, Crilly, then 26, picked up the gunman, Liam Townson, who was later convicted by the Special Criminal Court in Dublin.

Crilly was cleared at Belfast Crown Court today on all five charges which he faced, including kidnapping and false imprisonment as well as murder after he was accused of dropping off the killer.

Mr Justice Richard McLaughlin said: 'The prosecution has not proved beyond reasonable doubt the state of knowledge or intention necessary to transform the transporting of (Liam) Townson (who was convicted of the murder) by Crilly to an unspecified place at an unspecified time into a knowing participation in a potential murder. For these reasons I find the accused not guilty.'

Crilly had been asked about the killing by BBC Spotlight journalists and admitted he witnessed a 'battle' at the Three Steps Inn but the judge said this revelation did not prove Crilly's 'active participation' in the killing.

He said the evidence did not prove where Capt Nairac was at the time Crilly went to collect Townson or when he dropped him off, nor does the evidence establish when or by whom the decision was made to kill him.

'I have concluded that the prosecution has not proved Crilly was a participant in the abduction,' the judge added.

Described as a maverick, Captain Robert Nairac finally ran out of luck when he strode into a bar in an IRA heartland and broke into song.

The undercover soldier, who read spy novels as a child, told republicans in Drumintee's Three Steps Inn he was Danny, a comrade from Belfast.

As the night wore on and drinks flowed, the Grenadier Guardsman took to the stage and treated punters in the South Armagh watering hole to the rebel ballad Broad Black Brimmer.

They clapped and he sang again, and again.

Alone and without backup, the Oxford boxing blue, an assumed Belfast brogue replacing his clipped English accent, was trying to establish his republican credentials and win the confidence of the local IRA unit.

But for this soldier, one seemingly addicted to danger, it proved a risk too far.

Assaulted as he tried to leave, bundled into the back of a car and driven across the Irish border, the 29-year-old's last hours would be spent in agony as his attackers tried in vain to make him come clean.

Punched, kicked, pistol-whipped and beaten with a fence post, still he refused to talk.

At one point in the interrogation, an IRA man arrived dressed as a priest and tried to dupe the devout Catholic into confiding. It did not work.

Exasperated, his captors turned executioners and killed the unbroken captain with a bullet to the head.

His body has never been found amid rumours it was minced at a meat processing plant.

Two years later, he was posthumously awarded the George Cross, his citation hailing him a hero.

Much of the evidence in Crilly's trial centred on hair, believed to be that of Capt Nairac, which was discovered pulled out by the roots near the suspected murder scene at Ravensdale Forest, Co Louth, in the Irish Republic, and in a Cortina car belonging to Crilly's family. A large clump of hair was found in the Cortina.

The judge added: 'Given that the prosecution has been unable to prove a sufficient nexus between Crilly and the Cortina, the significance of the mass of hair found in it becomes irrelevant in proof of participation by Crilly in the murder or abduction.

'In any event, the vagueness of the strength of comparison with the reference sample would have made impossible to link the hair from the car with Capt Nairac beyond a reasonable doubt.'

Mr Justice McLaughlin also expressed concern about the evidence of a policeman who said he spoke to Crilly at his house after the killing.

He was not arrested and the Cortina was not seized for another two weeks.

Sergeant James Swanston told the court that, when he returned to arrest Crilly, he was gone.

The judge said: 'I cannot be satisfied beyond a reasonable doubt that Crilly told Sergeant Swanston he owned the car or had taken it to the Three Steps Inn, or that he visited the Crilly household during the Sunday immediately after Captain Nairac's disappearance or that he was directed by Detective Sergeant McCann to return to the house to arrest Crilly and seize the car.'

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