The Bloody Sunday Inquiry

BY FERN LANE


A senior manager of First Trust Bank has told the Bloody Sunday Inquiry that what happened on 30 January 1972 was "wanton murder". Michael Hegaty told the inquiry that, as a teenager, he had defied his parents' instruction to stay away from the civil rights march and had climbed out of a bathroom window, carrying a cine camera.

Hegarty described the moments when members of the Parachute Regiment entered the Bogside and began to open fire on civilians. "I knew that something was seriously wrong and that people were being killed," he said. "It was too wide open an area for people not to be shot. People were fleeing from the area of the Rossville Flats car park in all directions. There were women and children among them."

As he continued to shelter and run, the gunfire intensified. The shooting was horrendous, I was very frightened and I remember trying to work out which way to go."

Hegarty said that he sheltered in a nearby house until about half an hour after the shootings had finished. He then walked home with Charlie McGuigan, son of Barney, who was unaware that his father had been killed.

He also told the inquiry that he "did not form the impression that there was a gun battle in progress that day. I remember meeting my cousin, who was a priest. I remember him describing what happened as wanton murder. I have no reason to disagree with what he said. What happened that day was the biggest single injustice ever suffered by the people of Derry. The fact that it was perpetrated by the supposed forces of law and order rather than any illegal organisation makes that so."

The footage he had taken with his cine camera was not returned to him when he tried to get it developed. "Shortly after Bloody Sunday, I sent my cine camera film into Kodak for development," he said. "I received a letter back from Kodak saying that the film was 'undevelopable'. The film was not returned to me. This may be a coincidence but I have never had a film retained as 'undevelopable' before or since that day."

Another witness, Patrick Norris, who was a driver for Foyle Taxis at the time, described how he had been made to drive at gunpoint by a group of British soldiers. He said that on 30 January he got a call in the afternoon to go to Glenfada Park in the Bogside to pick up a fare. As he entered William Street he was stopped by British soldiers, who held him at gunpoint and ordered three other civilians into the back of the car. After driving around the block, he was ordered to stop and then placed in a truck with the other people, none of whom he knew.

"I was kneeling on the floor with my hands over my head and I was absolutely terrified," he said. "As far as I was concerned, I was being taken out of the city and may have been about to be shot".

He was taken to a warehouse in Fort George base and held in a wire pen. He said: "I had no idea what was going to happen to me, why I had been arrested or what the other people with me had done. At this stage, I still had no idea that there had been any trouble in Derry or that people had been shot and killed."

Norris told the inquiry that he was charged with riotous behaviour and his money and wedding ring were taken from him. The charges were eventually dropped but the money and wedding ring were never returned.

Matthew Connolly, giving evidence, said that he had personally witnessed the killing of John Young as he attempted to help another of the victims, probably Michael Kelly.

Connolly said that he saw 17-year-old Young leave the shelter of a gable wall to move towards the victim when he was himself shot through the head.

One of those arrested by troops on Bloody Sunday, George Roberts, told the inquiry that one of them had told him he was lucky he was "a bad shot" and had not killed him that day. Mr Roberts also said that the same soldier spat at him when he refused to sing The Sash or God Save the Queen.