Dead Man Running: A True Story of a Secret Agent's Escape from the IRA and MI5 (11 page)

But I was not going to accept that explanation, so I wrote to the Police Complaints Authority complaining about what had happened and asking them to investigate. Eight months later the PCA wrote to me saying, ‘It has not been possible to trace the officer responsible for placing the name on your record. This is due to a fault with the computer system at the time the information was entered.’

‘
Balls,’ I thought to myself.

But the PCA also revealed that my two names – Ashe and McGartland – were still on the DVLA computer files. The files also included my home address. And, once again, I was led to understand that it had been impossible to trace the person who had put both names and addresses on the DVLA computer due to a fault. The PCA added; ‘There is no evidence to show that the name was entered maliciously or that there was any intention to place you in danger. There is also no evidence to suggest that any officer, apart from those entrusted with the information, was informed of your background.’ The Chairman of the Police Complaints Authority, Peter Moorhouse, wrote to Ronnie Campbell, my MP; ‘I have now read the investigation file . . . Northumbria Police of course acknowledges that Mr Ashe’s other identity was on the force computer. They maintain with some justification that Mr Ashe’s continued breaches of the Road Traffic Act had brought him to the notice of a number of traffic officers, one of whom accessed Mr Ashe’s name on the DVLA computer and there learned of Mr Ashe’s other identity. The officer entered the alias on the police computer with the result that when Mr Ashe requested a data protection report the entry came to light. There is nothing unusual in the fact that this item of intelligence was entered on to the computer and nothing sinister should be read into the entry.’ The letter went on to accuse me of being indiscreet and of being regularly stopped driving a car for which the owner was listed on the Police National Computer as one ‘Marty McGartland’ (sic). I was furious by the response because it was inaccurate. At no time had that car been registered under the name McGartland. Of course, the police should never have entered the name McGartland on that computer file, or any file that could be accessed by officers, giving details of both my identities, background and particulars. Indeed, the names of all British agents – giving details of their work for British Intelligence – should never under any circumstances be put on a police computer file for the same reason. To permit thousands of police officers access to such material is a serious breach of security. It is well known in the security services in Northern Ireland that the IRA send political activists to be trained as computer experts in Britain, learning how to hack into computer systems, so that they can trace names, addresses, phone numbers, social security numbers, car registration numbers etc of anyone they want to target. Instructions are issued by the Home Office to every police force in Britain ordering them to make sure that no such information is input into any police file. At first, I believed in my innocence that the instruction was simply ignored. But I began to suspect the hand of MI5 was behind this despicable act of duplicity. It seemed extraordinary that the Northumbria Police had found it impossible to trace the person or persons responsible and yet, as a result, anyone with access to those files would have been able to find exactly where I lived. But I now had to face a more pressing personal challenge, facing an open court with a jury sitting in judgement. My ordeal in Newcastle Crown Court before Judge Denis Orde began at 10 a.m. on 16 May 1997, when I was charged with attempting to pervert the course of justice. I pleaded not guilty. The first legal arguments centred around the question as to whether the media should be permitted to cover the court case on a daily basis. The prosecution, headed by Mark Styles, argued that the hearing should be in public because there was no reason why it should not be. He contested that I was in no danger from any source and had pleaded not guilty in an effort to gain publicity for
Fifty Dead Men Walking
which had been published five months before. As a consequence, my defence, headed by Mr Glenn Gatland, was forced to tell the judge the reason why the press should be banned from reporting the case until after it was over. Mr Gatland explained that because the Northumbria Police had refused my application for police protection throughout the court case he feared there was a danger that IRA men intent on killing me could take the opportunity to shoot me as I entered or left the court. As I sat in court throughout that first day I wondered who it was that had persuaded the prosecution to put forward such a legal argument, all but forcing my defence lawyer to reveal my background at the very beginning of the trial. I felt suddenly lonely and unprotected, as though all the forces of the British legal system, including the police, were intent on revealing my identity and my home address. I knew that the Crown Prosecution Service would have been fully aware that the line of argument they had taken in court could only end with my two identities being revealed. As I looked round the courtroom from my position in the dock I felt a sense of desolation and hopelessness; that I was unable to take action myself that could retrieve the situation. My mind went back to that awful day in August 1991 when I lay on the sofa in that stiflingly hot flat in Twinbrook, Belfast, waiting for the IRA execution squad to arrive. I wondered what the judge could do that day to alleviate my anxieties, particularly as he too was a member of the British legal system. I realised that he too was in a difficult position. It was with a great sense of relief that after deliberation Judge Orde decreed that the public gallery should remain open and that reporters should be allowed to attend court and take notes, but that no publicity or photographs whatsoever should be permitted until after the trial was ended for fear of someone tipping off potential assassins. It wasn’t a perfect solution from my viewpoint but it was better than I had anticipated as I listened to the legal arguments put forward by the prosecution. Although I felt somewhat a fool I walked into court and left court each day wearing a hooded coat, scarf and dark glasses. The suggestion had been made by one of my old buddies in the Belfast Special Branch. He advised me to take no chances. I told the court that one of the licences in the name of Ashe had, in fact, been organised by the Special Branch. I also told them that every time I appeared before local magistrates for speeding offences I could not tell them the real reason for my speeding offence because I would have blown my cover, exposing my two identities, something which RUC Special Branch officers had advised me not to do under any circumstances. I told the judge that I had obtained the two other licences using false addresses to avoid details of my true whereabouts being held on record. I also emphasised that I never had any intention of perverting the course of justice. I was indeed fortunate that I had friends who came to my rescue during my four-day trial. Sam Cushnahan, of Families Against Intimidation and Terror, a Northern Ireland pressure group for peace, gave evidence saying that I was one of two people heading the IRA’s most-wanted list. He told the court, ‘People who are caught informing on the IRA are tortured and then murdered. As far as the IRA is concerned, it would be a great propaganda coup to murder Martin McGartland. His death would be seen as a lesson to others who infiltrate their security.’ My lawyer, Glenn Gatland, explained to the jury that each time I was stopped by police I could not explain my true identity because I feared detection from ‘moles’. He explained that throughout the early 1990s Britain’s anti-terrorist police knew an IRA cell was living and operating in the north-east targeting high-profile establishments, and would have certainly informed their IRA commanders in Belfast if they had discovered that I was living in Newcastle. I had to bite my tongue on several occasion, however, when Mr Mark Styles for the prosecution tried to play down the relevance to the case of what I and others had done on behalf of the people of Northern Ireland in risking our lives to save others. But what I found even more upsetting was Styles’ efforts to similarly question the relevance of the savage beating of my brother Joseph by an IRA punishment squad as of little consequence. In July 1996, only ten months before the court case, Joseph was left with two shattered legs, four broken ribs and two broken arms. However, I felt like shaking the hand of every member of the jury of six men and six women when they were shown photographs of the terrible beating poor Joseph had taken. They saw photographs taken shortly after his savage IRA treatment, carried out solely because I was his brother. Every member of the jury first looked at the pictures and then glanced up, a look of revulsion on their faces. Mr Styles also tried to play down the threat to my life by the IRA, stating in open court that he had spoken to a Special Branch officer outside the court who informed him that the threat against me was ‘minimal’. So I immediately asked Mr Styles and the judge to bring to bring the SB officer into court so that he could be cross-examined. Mr Styles immediately changed the subject and refused to produce the so-called SB man to the court. But on occasions there was also humour. When Sam Cushnahan was being questioned by my barrister, he was asked what his views were in relation to the threat on my life by the IRA. Cushnahan replied that, with his knowledge of the IRA, I would need to look over my shoulder for the rest of my life.

Cushnahan was asked to put himself in my shoes concerning the speeding offences. ‘What would you have done if you had been in Mr McGartland’s position?’

His reply was, ‘I would not only have been exceeding the speed limit but I would have been driving through ditches, over rivers and, if my car had wings, I would have been flying.’

The entire court burst into laughter.

Seconds later the jury looked anxious and some of the women close to tears when Mr Cushnahan told them, ‘There are probably young men from this area that served with the security forces in Northern Ireland walking the streets today unaware of the fact that this man standing in the dock saved their lives at great risk to his own life.’ In his summing up to the jury Mr Styles went further, saying that at no time was I in any danger while living in Newcastle and they should not believe the story I had told the court that I had obtained the two driving licences for fear of being targeted by the IRA. He claimed that I had used a deliberate course of conduct to deceive courts over my driving record. Getting different licences had been pre-planned and he claimed I had acted with a total disregard for the law. After a two-hour summing up Judge Orde sent the jury to consider their verdict. They came back within ten minutes and unanimously returned a verdict of ‘not guilty’. I tried to contain myself but couldn’t do so for the relief after nearly two years of stress and anxiety while waiting for the case to come to trial had taken its toll. I sat down in the dock and wept. In a statement after the case my solicitor Nigel Dodds said; ‘The prosecution has deliberately exposed my client to further danger. He will now have to move house, relocate to a different area and change his identity once again. My client should never have been brought to court in the light of his services in Northern Ireland. The prosecution has exposed him to danger which hi resettlement on the mainland was meant to avoid. It appears he has been thrown to the wolves by the Special Branch.’ My acquittal at Newcastle Crown Court was welcomed by MP’s, the newspapers and Tynesiders who believed the case should never have been brought against me. Former Northern Ireland Minister Peter Bottomley was one of a group of MP’s trying to establish a new identity for me. Both Labour and Tory MP’s from the New Dialogue peace group approached Northern Ireland secretary Mo Mowlam and Home Secretary Jack Straw urging them to arrange a new ID for me. In a nationwide TV programme, Peter Bottomley said, ‘Without trying to turn Martin McGartland into a saint, I think what he was doing was saintly, trying to reduce the effectiveness of a killing machine which has helped put three thousand people into cemeteries. Thousands of Tynesiders signed a petition in the days following the court case calling on the Government to give me a new identity as a matter of urgency. I was touched that so many people from Tyneside should stand up and be counted when I was a stranger in their midst, an Irishman who had come to the north-east seeking sanctuary. Tynesiders had revealed how kind and generous they are to total strangers. But despite the great support and the wonderful court victory, I was a deeply worried man.

Chapter Six

As I walked into my home at the end of the court case, feeling exhilarated and vindicated, I knew that I had to discover why the Northumbria Police had gone to such lengths not only to embarrass me, charging me with trying to pervert the course of justice, but also by their tactics ensuring that my two identities and my home address would be revealed in open court. It seemed to me that they could not have done more to identify me and my home if they had made an announcement in the press! But I was convinced that the answers to these conundrums lay not at the Northumbria Police headquarters in Newcastle-upon-Tyne but, more than likely, in Belfast. To my knowledge the Northumbria Police, even the Northumbria Special Branch, had nothing against me. They hardly knew me. Of course, I understood that the Northumbria Police had been informed by the Special Branch in Northern Ireland of my arrival on their patch. They would have been told that I was being relocated to the mainland for security reasons and I knew that the Northumbria Special Branch were asked to ‘keep an eye on me’. The SB in Belfast had told me that there was a special department in the Home Office in London whose specific duty was to relocate and take care of agents and informers who had worked for the Government in Northern Ireland in a variety of different jobs, and all of whom were at risk of being taken out by the IRA. This office in inside Whitehall found suitable places for targeted people and their families to settle on the mainland, provided them with a new identity, a new passport, a new social security number and, on occasions, finding them a job too. Some of those forced to flee the Province were provided with money to set up in business on their own, while others were provided with training for a skilled job. Nearly all were bought houses or flats by the Home Office, though only after they had been invited to view their new homes, along with their spouses. Special attention was given to those with children so that homes were purchased near suitable schools. And yet, when it appeared that I had broken the law by having two separate driving licences under two different names, the reasons for having the licences were totally ignored both by the police and the Crown Prosecution Service. I explained to the Northumbria Police the reasons why I had the two licences, one under the name Martin Ashe, with an address in Durham, the other under the name Martin David Ashe with an address in Northumberland. I was laying a false trail in an effort to thwart any PIRA investigations into my whereabouts because after Angie’s return back home I feared they might re-double their efforts to trace me. Before taking out the new licence in Durham I had been to the Northumbria Special Branch, pleading with them to move me from my home to another residence, but they refused. I urged the Northumbria authorities to check my story with the Special Branch in Belfast and yet, despite my appeals, they still decided to go ahead and prosecute. As my appeals for the truth were ignored and the story of my years inside the IRA treated with derision it became increasingly obvious to me that someone, somewhere, was pulling strings with the authorities, ensuring that I would be taken to court, my two identities exposed to the public at large. I came to the conclusion that someone in authority had ‘had a few words’ with the Northumbria Police authorities and the Crown Prosecution Service suggesting that my legitimate defence should be ignored and that every action should be taken to get me to court. There was only one reason why this course of events should be encouraged and that was to expose my double life. In doing so, of course, the Northumbria Police would have been fully aware that there was every danger that my real identity – Martin McGartland, a man the IRA had sentence to death – would be revealed to the court and the world at large, exposing me to the danger of being targeted by an IRA active service unit. I knew from former friends in West Belfast that the IRA were actively searching for me in England. If found, I was to be summarily executed for I had revealed my ‘guilt’ in the book I had written. Now there was no need for the IRA to kidnap and torture me. All they required was my execution. I sensed the work of MI5 behind the machinations designed to expose me. As a result of everything Mike, my SB friend, had told me I was now deeply suspicious of all the secret intelligence and security service, not knowing if and when they might strike. But what worried me and what spurred me on to continue to continue my investigations was the fact that if any government agency, such as MI5, decided to kill me, they could then quite conveniently blame my ‘execution’ on an IRA active service unit seeking revenge for my ‘treachery’. If it was true that MI5 had organised my kidnap back in Belfast in August 1991 then I had to take great precautions in case the bastards were still intent on having me disposed of. The thought made me angry. Hardly a day had passed without me thinking about what Mike had told me and I had come to the conclusion that he had been telling the truth, that my abduction and kidnapping had been deliberately planned by MI5 and their associates in Northern Ireland. And yet, what frustrated me was the fact that I had no real idea why they should have wanted to carry out such an evil scheme. I racked my brains trying to find a logical reason why they would have wanted me out of the way to such an extent that they preferred to make me go through the horrors of an IRA kangaroo court, torture and eventual execution rather than simply put me on a boat to the mainland and arrange a new identity. I had to assume that they were irritated by my survival, for they had obviously wanted me to be out of the way for reasons I knew nothing about. I would think back to my long conversation with Mike trying to make sense of everything. I had no idea who this unknown and mysterious senior British Intelligence agent could be that Mike had told me was the real reason for the plot to have me murdered. But the fact that I had survived, running MI5’s little game of espionage, and had probably annoyed the Tasking Co-ordination Group that covered the Belfast area. On a number of occasions Special Branch handlers had told me that to the MI5 hierarchy their agents and informers were considered nothing but ‘touts’, local Catholics who could be used and treated like an inferior underclass until their services were no longer required. To them, it did not matter a damn that someone had risked his life for four years saving other people’s lives. I could not escape the fundamental fact that in my case it had obviously been far more important in MI5’s judgement to sacrifice me, in case my very existence should jeopardise their great espionage plan for the Province. To me, that seemed the only possible reason because I could not believe that senior MI5 officers would behave with such callous disregard for human life. I had to assume that those self-same senior intelligence officers who enjoyed having the power of life and death were probably behind the machinations which had resulted in my two identities being revealed in open court. I suspected that those officers also reserved the power to influence both the Northumbria Police and the Crown Prosecution Service, ensuring that the charges brought against me went ahead. They wouldn’t mind if I was convicted or set free, for their objective would have been achieved – the revelation of my identity in open court. I made myself a cup of tea and walked into the sitting-room, thrilled at being a free man but thinking all the time of the possible alternatives now facing me. But however much I tried to give MI5 the benefit of the doubt I found it all but impossible to count them out of the equation. Of course those officers behind my kidnap could have been members of the RUC Special Branch, though I doubted it. I knew those men, I had enjoyed a good relationship with them for four years. It could all have been an accident of fate but the more I examined precisely what had happened to me that August day in 1991 the more I came to the conclusion that the whole wretched business had been a set-up. Now in my heart I was certain that I had two enemies to contend with, two sets of people hell-bent in killing me; MI5 and the IRA. But accepting that both organisations might want me out of the way meant that I had to redouble my efforts to safeguard my identity. More importantly, I had to be on my guard against any other authority who might decide to take me out and make my death appear to be an IRA vendetta. Now, more than ever, I was on my own. My first thought was to move from the north-east, tell no one of my plans, but simply try to disappear somewhere on the mainland; change my name by deed poll and adopt a new identity in another major British town or city. But then I would have no passport, no social security number and no chance of getting a job and making a living. Often during the years I had lived in the north-east my mates had ragged me, giving me the name ‘semtex’. I would take no notice and never take offence because I realised it was their way of showing friendship. But the nickname held a warning to me. With my strong Irish accent, getting a job anywhere on the mainland would be a major problem especially when the IRA were still bombing major targets, making ordinary people and especially employers wary of hiring any young Irish labour. Before reaching definite conclusions, however, I determined to try and discover the truth for myself, to see whether the information Mike had given me was in fact true. Before I fell asleep that night I determined to go to Ireland, to see friends who had close links with the IRA and in the security services, the RUC and the Special Branch. In returning to Northern Ireland I accepted that I was taking the most enormous risk and yet, in a funny sort of way, I knew I would feel safer back in Belfast for a short visit than sitting in my flat in Blyth waiting for a knock on the door, checking my car for UCBT’s every time I drove off and never knowing whether the person across the street might be watching and targeting me. But getting to the bottom of this puzzle was paramount, even more important than my own safety. I preferred to return to Belfast, grasp the nettle and risk all rather than at home like a sitting duck.