Dead Man Running: A True Story of a Secret Agent's Escape from the IRA and MI5 (12 page)

After reaching that decision I went out to celebrate my court victory. Firstly, I went to my favourite cafe in Newcastle, ate a great plate of the best fish and chips and then drove out of town to enjoy a few pints of Newcastle Brown as a celebration in a pub where no one knew my identity. There had been newspaper photographers outside the court throughout the four-day trial but I had ensured my anonymity by walking in and out of court wearing dark glasses, my face protected by a scarf. I was almost certain that no one could have recognised me. As I drank my beer and thought of what was happening to my life I realised that I had to melt into the background once again, keep a low profile and regain my anonymity. As soon as possible I needed to start a new life, move to a new city, take yet another new identity with a new name. It saddened me to leave my mates in Blyth and Newcastle, the people who had known me as Martin Ashe and who nicknamed me ‘Ashie’ and ‘Semtex’. The people had been kind to me, in fact wonderfully friendly and generous, accepting me as one of their own, giving me a break and even offering me the friendship and hospitality of their own homes. In Blyth and Newcastle I had felt at home, had felt safe among friends, but now I would have to throw away those years and start all over again. It made me feel angry that someone in authority had decided to do all in their power to ruin my life, and for what?

‘
Fuck it,’ I said almost inaudibly and downed another pint. That made me feel better, though the anger wouldn’t go away. But as well as anger there was jubilation for, finally, after 17 months of worry and anxiety, I had persuaded a jury of six women and six men that I was not some reckless young tearaway who had tried to cheat justice. Indeed, the jury had made the Northumbria Police and the Crown Prosecution Service look like a bunch of amateurs who had been determined to punish a young man on charges which the jury rejected. Put simply, the jury had refused to believe the evidence put before them and, instead, they had put their faith in me and my evidence, realising that the story I told in court had been the truth.

I hoped that one reason the jury believed my evidence was the fact that I had been vindicated by three tributes made during the trial. In court, Sam Cushnahan of FAIT had verified the work I had done in Northern Ireland and the fact that I was at the very top of the IRA’s death list. And there had been two other pieces of evidence, both from beyond the grave, which had highlighted my work for British Intelligence.

Six months before my trial a book entitled
Phoenix – Policing The Shadows
whose subtitle read ‘The Secret War Against Terrorism in Northern Ireland’ had been published , jointly written by Jack Holland and Susan Phoenix, the wife of the late Detective Superintendent Ian Phoenix, former head of the Northern Ireland police counter-surveillance unit who died in June 1994. Along with 25 other senior anti-terrorist intelligence officers, Ian Phoenix died when a Chinook helicopter crashed into the side of the Mull of Kintyre. There were no survivors. But in his diaries Superintendent Phoenix wrote at length about me under my code-name ‘Carol’, saying, ‘Carol was certainly one of the Special Branch’s best spies in the 1990s’. Phoenix’s diaries revealed various intelligence reports that I had made to the Special Branch enabling lives to be saved.

There was a further tribute from a former Assistant Chief Constable, Brian Fitzsimons, who was in charge of the Special Branch during the early 1990s. He too had died in the same Chinook helicopter crash. After my kidnap by the IRA Fitzsimons had said, ‘McGartland was very productive agent’.

I knew that going alone to Belfast would be a risky affair and yet there was no other way that I could make contact with the people I needed to question and cross-examine if I was to discover, once and for all, who, if anyone, was behind my kidnap. I knew that to telephone anyone in Northern Ireland could be suicidal because I knew that in the cauldron of Northern Ireland politics and the fight against terrorism many phones are monitored or bugged by the various security agencies. I knew that I could never hold an open, indiscreet conversation by phone because the person I was talking to would know that their phones were tapped by the security services. I knew from my time working with the SB that the security services in the Province run a highly sophisticated phone-tapping operation.

I had been to Northern Ireland once since being relocated to mainland Britain. In October 1996 I was asked to attend the Lisburn County Court to give evidence regarding my claim for compensation from the Government concerning the criminal injuries I received when escaping from the IRA following my kidnap. The Compensation Agency had refused to give me any compensation because they claimed that I had been a member of the IRA, a terrorist organisation, and therefore was not entitled to a single penny. Of course, I informed the court that I had joined the IRA on the specific instruction of the RUC Special Branch and had worked as an agent inside the IRA providing valuable intelligence to the security services.

The Compensation Agency also informed my solicitors that I could not be paid any compensation because I had failed to comply with instructions to submit my medical records, detailing my injuries. There was, however, a very good reason why I had not submitted the medical records. Within days of my leaving the Royal Victoria Hospital in Belfast, and being transferred to protective custody in Palace Barracks, the Special Branch had taken possession of my records and had them destroyed. As a result there were no records whatsoever of my injuries.

Within days of receiving the date to attend court in Lisburn I called the Special Branch in Belfast asking whether I could be given police protection during the 24 hours I expected to be in Northern Ireland. I was told that I would be given no police protection during the time I was in the Province. This both surprised and perplexed me. It seemed extraordinary that I should be given no police protection for the Special Branch, more than anyone else in Northern Ireland, knew that the IRA were intent on finding and, more importantly, killing me.

I had more than half-a-dozen phone conversation with RUC officers at their headquarters in Belfast as well as contacting senior Special Branch officers over a period of four weeks but those conversations only referred to my forthcoming court appearance. From each and every one of the officers I spoke to I received the same answer – a categoric ‘no’. Some of the conversations were remarkably open in telling me that I would receive no help or assistance whatsoever, let alone police protection.

‘
There is no way the Branch would give you protection,’ one senior SB officer told me.

‘
Why not?’ I asked.

‘
We’re nothing to do with you any more, Marty,’ he said.

‘
Since when?’ I replied.

‘
Since you got a pay off and left the Province,’ he said.

‘
But if I’m to come back to attend a compensation court, I’ll need police protection,’ I argued.

‘
Your compensation is fuck all to do with the RUC.’

‘
What do you mean?’ I said. ‘It’s only because of the work I did for you that I ended up jumping from the flat,’ I explained, feeling more irate at the obdurate attitude of the officer.

‘
Listen, Marty,’ he went on, ‘can’t you get it into your skull that you’re nothing to do with us anymore? We owe you nothing. If you want to fight for compensation then that’s your business. But don’t expect the RUC to spend their time watching your back. It’s down to you.’

‘
So that’s all the thanks I get for risking my fucking neck for four years,’ I said, shouting at him, enraged that the RUC should treat me so appallingly.

‘
Marty,’ he said again, ‘any favours that were afforded to you, you blew by your antics. We owe you nothing.

‘
What do you mean?’ I asked.

‘
You know well enough,’ he replied.

I knew full well that he was referring to the murder of Private Tony Harrison, the 21-year-old soldier of the 3
^rd
Parachute Regiment who was gunned down by two Provo killers in June 1991. Harrison had been staying at the home of his fiancée Tracy Gouck in Nevis Avenue off the Holywood Road, Belfast. Later, Tracey had described how at 6.30 p.m. on 19 June she had answered a knock at the door to see two men standing there. One man had put a gun to her head and forced her into the living-room. The second gunman then fired five shots at her fiancé, hitting him in the head and body before fleeing to their getaway car. Later, one of the gunman named Paul gave details of the operation to the IRA cell of which I was a member. He told us, ‘It was a piece of piss. The bastard didn’t even move. We got him still sitting on the sofa in the living-room. I let him have it, firing into the body and the head, just to make sure.’

I stood there listening to this sickening tale of cold-blooded murder, my mind racing, my body shaking, a terrible empty feeling in the pit of my stomach for, in that PIRA operation, I had been the driver of the getaway car. In fact I had no alternative but to drive the car ferrying the two gunmen to the victim’s address. Four weeks earlier another IRA member, a young man named Jimmy, told me that they had heard a paratrooper was living in a house off Holywood Road but had no precise address. They thought he would make an easy target and decided to find out where he lived. I reported all this to my SB handler Felix but I had no name for the soldier and no address. He said the SB would do all in their power to find the young man, warn him and move him. Felix was so concerned that later the same day he and I returned to the area, driving up and down the streets in a vain search for the soldier. I heard no more and believed my IRA active service unit had dropped the operation.

But on the morning of Wednesday, 19 June 1991, I was contacted by one of the IRA messengers and told to report to my IRA cell commander ‘Spud@ Murphy. When I arrived he told me, ‘This is not a meeting, Marty, we’ve got a job for you. You’re to drive Stephen and Paul on an operation.’

My heart sank. Though I had no idea what the operation entailed I feared the worst, knowing Paul to be one of the IRA’s principal assassins, a ruthless bastard who had a reputation for carrying out the most daring attacks and a man with a ferocious hatred of anyone who opposed the Republican cause. Even his mates believed he was a man without feeling.

Spud said, ‘The car’s outside. It’s hot; it’s just been hijacked, so dump it immediately afterwards.’

As we drove away Stephen asked, ‘Do you knew East Belfast, Marty?’

‘
Aye,’ I replied.

‘
That’s where we’re heading,’ he said. ‘A house in Nevis Avenue off Holywood Road.’

I knew instinctively that I was driving to the home of the soldier whom they had planned to shoot in cold blood. I wondered what I should do; wondered what the hell I could do to save this poor man’s life. As we drove along I prayed that the soldier was away from home because I realised that with Paul there was no question of his life being spared. If he was at home I knew he would be shot dead. I debated whether I should try any trick, like stalling the car or crashing into another vehicle, as if by accident. But Stephen, sitting beside me, was armed with a hand-gun and I knew that if he suspected I was not playing straight, he would shoot me and walk away without a second thought. I was already convinced that Spud Murphy was seriously suspicious of me and believed that I had been brought in as driver on this ‘op’ to test me.

‘
Stop here,’ said Stephen, as we turned into Nevis Avenue. ‘I’ll be back soon.’

A few minutes later Paul arrived in another hijacked car and parked nearby. As Stephen got out of the car and walked away I prayed to God that the soldier had been spirited away by the Branch as most men had been when I discovered that the IRA were targeting them. I knew that the Special Branch, and all the security services, did everything possible to save all targeted men, not just police officers and army personnel. But during the past month the Branch had told me nothing to indicate whether their search for the soldier had been successful or not.

I wound down the car window so that I would hear if any shots were fired. ‘Please God, please God,’ I kept repeating to myself, praying I would hear nothing. I waited what seemed an age but it was probably only a couple of minutes. Then I heard the shots – one, two, three, four, five. I counted them, wincing at every shot and I felt wretched and nauseous. I knew in my heart that the poor bastard had been murdered. My hands were shaking and I broke into a cold sweat as I rammed the car into first gear and drove towards the two IRA killers as they walked from the house. I slowed down and they jumped into the back seat of the car.

‘
Fuckin’ drive,’ said Paul, ‘fuckin drive.’ I said not a word but drove, screeching the tyres as I sped away trying to put distance between us and the scene of the shooting. Two hundred yards down the road, Paul said, ‘Stop the car.’ After I braked and stopped, Paul shouted, ‘Dump it; dump it here, then fuck off.’

I knew that my involvement in the murder of Tony Harrison caused a ferocious argument within the Special Branch and the RUC at the highest levels. There were those who believed that I should be arrested and charged with conspiracy with being an accessory to murder. But my RUC handlers fought tooth and nail for the matter to be dropped, arguing that I had no option but to do as I was told by my IRA cell commander. They knew that there was no way I could have got out of driving that getaway car unless I was to blow my cover and I was under instructions to do all in my power never to reveal that I was working for the Branch. That confession would have signed my own death warrant, and also meant that another agent had been rumbled by the IRA, putting the fear of God into every other informant working for the RUC or the SB. However, I knew from my Branch friends that my involvement in the murder of Tony Harrison had put a giant question-mark against my name, many RUC officers believing that the Branch should, at the very least, have got rid of me.