MI5 'halted police child abuse investigation' ...

By Rebecca Camber
Daily Mail
February 17, 2015

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2956442/MI5-halted-police-child-abuse-investigation-Victims-children-s-home-accuse-security-service-colluding-protect-abusers.html

Victims of abuse at the Kincor children's home in Northern Ireland, pictured, have accused senior members of the security services of blocking police investigations

Claims that children were molested for years because police and the British security services were using the home to gather intelligence is already subject to a separate inquiry led by Sir Anthony Hart, pictured

MI5 blocked police investigations into sexual abuse at a children’s home to protect their intelligence gathering operation, campaigners will tell the High Court today.

Victims of abuse at the Kincora children’s home in Northern Ireland have accused senior members of the security services of colluding in protecting abusers from being investigated or prosecuted.

Campaigners are taking legal action at the High Court in Belfast to force a full independent inquiry with the power to force MI5 witnesses to testify and release documents.

The case is the first to examine allegations of a British state cover-up of abuse at the East Belfast home in the 1970s.

Claims that children were molested for years because police and the British security services were using the home, run by a member of a Protestant paramilitary organisation, to gather intelligence are already subject to a separate inquiry in Northern Ireland, the Historical and Institutional Abuse (HIA) inquiry, led by Sir Anthony Hart.

But critics of the HIA claim it lacks sufficient powers to get to the heart of the scandal as it may not be able to compel either evidence or witnesses from MI5.

Victims are applying for a judicial review to establish a similar full inquiry in Northern Ireland to the London-based child abuse inquiry, now chaired by Justice Lowell Goddard from New Zealand.

Lawyers for the victims have lodged papers in Belfast High Court arguing: ‘There is credible evidence (and it is therefore arguable) that the security forces and security services were aware of the abuse, permitted it to continue and colluded in protecting the individuals involved from investigation or prosecution.’

Senior members of the Loyalist community, the British Army and the Royal Ulster Constabulary have also been accused of collusion, blackmail and cover-up.

One alleged victim of the abuse at Kincora, Gary Hoy, was placed there with his younger brother in the 1970s.

He said in a sworn affidavit: ‘If we had had a proper inquiry in the 1980s then I wouldn’t have to relive this again today. MI5 and MI6 cannot be allowed to hide things, and I believe everything needs to be brought out into the open.

‘I find it heart-wrenching that there were security men could have been behind the abuse or involved in it … Because they were in positions of authority or supposed to be protecting the state they get away with it.’

Solicitor Kevin Winters who is representing Mr Hoy and other survivors said: ‘The allegations of our clients and others have been in the public domain for years; the role of state has been alleged for a long time. There is now an opportunity for the truth to be uncovered for our clients to be able to move on with their fractured lives.

‘This opportunity is possibly being lost because of the UK government’s fear of being exposed to impunity and straightforward corruption and criminality against innocents used as pawns in a cynical political exercise.’

He added: ‘This is about state agents in a very dark episode of the conflict in the North of Ireland.’

A former British military official has also backed a full inquiry.
There are longstanding claims that MI5 blocked one or more police investigations into Kincora in the 1970s

Colin Wallace, a former army information officer in Northern Ireland, said: ‘There is now irrefutable evidence that previous inquiries were deliberately engineered or manipulated to mislead parliament by concealing the role of government agencies in covering up the abuses.’

In 1981, three men were imprisoned for between four and six years for a number of offences relating to systematic sexual abuse of children over a period of years.

But the allegations of MI5 involvement have never been fully examined.

It has suggested that William McGrath, Kincora’s housemaster and the leader of an extreme evangelical Protestant group called Tara, was an informant for British intelligence.

McGrath was jailed for sexual offences in 1981 and is now dead.

An Amnesty International spokesman said: ‘There are longstanding claims that MI5 blocked one or more police investigations into Kincora in the 1970s in order to protect its own intelligence-gathering operation, a terrible indictment which raises the spectre of countless vulnerable boys having faced further years of brutal abuse.

‘It’s only Justice Goddard’s inquiry that will be able to ensure that evidence doesn’t remain hidden in Whitehall filing cabinets and that even senior politicians will have to attend the inquiry.’

A Home Office spokesperson said: ‘The government is cooperating fully with all investigations into allegations relating to the Kincora boys’ home. It is not appropriate to comment further while these investigations are under way.’