O'Loan to Probe Claims That 13-Year-Old Was an Informer

national | miscellaneous | news report Wednesday November 06, 2002 16:06 by Danielle Ni Dhighe - Irish Republican Socialist Movement danielle at irsm dot org

O'Loan to Probe Claims That 13-Year-Old Was an Informer

Irish News
5 November 2002

O'Loan to Probe Claims That 13-Year-Old Was an Informer
By Barry McCaffrey

Police Ombudsman Nuala O'Loan is to investigate claims that a 13-year-
old Belfast schoolboy was recruited as a police informer.

The 13-year-old, who was too frightened to be named, says he was
approached by a plain clothed policeman while being questioned in
Oldpark police station on suspicion of car theft earlier this year.
He claims the officer told him charges against him would be dropped
if he agreed to work as an informer.

"I was given a number and told to ask for Johnny if I had any
information," the teenager said.

The teenager's double life is understood to have been exposed after an
INLA arms dump was uncovered in Ardoyne and the paramilitary group
suspected the 13-year-old.

It is understood the paramilitary group then asked Holy Cross rector
Fr Aidan Troy to intervene. Fr Troy said: "I spoke to the young lad
and his mother independently to assure myself that what was being
alleged was true. I am sorry to say that this story appears to be
authentic.

"This is a 13 year-old child with special needs whose very life was
being put in danger by what he was being asked to do. My concern is
solely for the rights of this child, nothing to do with politics."

This is the second allegation of police using teenage informers which
Mrs O'Loan has been asked to investigate.

In April a 19-year-old Ardoyne teenager claimed that he had been
forced to work as a police informer from the age of 14.

A police spokeswoman said it would be inappropriate to comment on a
case which was to be investigated by the ombudsman.