Europe and Central Asia Summary of Amnesty International’s Concerns in the Region, January-June 2007 inquest into Pearse Jordan’s death could go ahead under existing rules, which do not allow a jury sitting in Northern Ireland to give a verdict of lawful or unlawful killing, unlike inquest juries in England and Wales. However, the Law Lords also ruled that a coroner’s inquest could make sufficient findings of fact concerning how the deceased came by his death to resolve any factual conclusions on matters in dispute. In the McCaughey case, heard at the same time as the Jordan case, the Law Lords held that the Northern Ireland police had a statutory duty to provide the coroner with all the information they had concerning the death, subject to any relevant legal privilege or immunity. Following the Law Lords’ decision in this case, it is now open for the inquest into the death of Pearse Jordan to proceed. Gervaise McKerr (update to AI Index: EUR 01/005/2004) Gervaise McKerr, a member of the IRA, was shot dead by officers of the RUC in 1982, in disputed circumstances. RUC officers opened fire on a car that he was driving, killing him and the two passengers, who were also members of the IRA. At the time of their deaths all three men were unarmed. Although prosecutions were brought, no police officer was convicted. It emerged that senior police officers had concocted a false version of events and instructed policemen to give false testimony. As a result of public concern, John Stalker, a then senior UK police officer, was appointed in 1984 to examine apparent cover-ups in this and other cases where fatalities had occurred as the result of an alleged ‘shoot to kill’ policy on the part of the RUC. He reexamined the evidence in all the cases and believed that he had uncovered crucial new evidence. He alleged that he was obstructed from carrying out a full investigation, and before completion he was removed from duty. The inquiry was completed in 1987 by Colin Sampson, a UK Chief Constable. Amnesty International 141 The findings of the Stalker/Sampson inquiry have never been published. In 1988, it was announced that the inquiry had uncovered evidence that RUC officers had attempted or conspired to pervert the course of justice. Nevertheless, because of “national security” and “public interest” considerations, no officer was prosecuted. Disciplinary hearings resulted in 18 officers being reprimanded and one cautioned. In 1984, a coroner’s inquest into the death of Gervaise McKerr was opened. It was subsequently adjourned to await completion of the Stalker/Sampson investigation, and the outcome of two sets of judicial review proceedings. In September 1994, the coroner abandoned the inquest, after the High Court of Northern Ireland set aside the subpoena the coroner had served on the RUC for disclosure of the report of the Stalker/Sampson inquiry. In 1993, the family of Gervaise McKerr had lodged an application with the ECtHR, alleging that there had been no effective investigation into the circumstances of his death. In 2001, the ECtHR gave judgment in this case and three others (those of Pearse Jordan, above, Patrick Kelly and others, below, and Patrick Shanaghan, below) and found that the investigations carried out by the UK into all of these deaths amounted to a violation of Article 2 ECHR, for reasons including a lack of independence, a failure to conduct the investigations with reasonable promptness, and a failure to provide relevant information – including, in the relevant cases, concerning the findings of the Stalker/Sampson investigation – to the families of victims and to the coroners conducting the inquests into these deaths. After the HRA came into force in the UK in 2000, establishing in primary domestic legislation human rights that are “expressed in the same terms” as their equivalents in the ECHR, the family of Gervaise McKerr brought fresh legal proceedings seeking to compel the UK government to instigate a new investigation into his death. In March 2004, the Law Lords ruled that the HRA did not have AI Index: EUR 01/010/2007