Omagh bombing convict wins retrial

DUBLIN - The only person jailed for involvement in Northern Ireland's bloodiest single attack, the 1998 Omagh bombing, won his appeal against conviction on Friday and will be given a retrial.

Colm Murphy, from the border town of Dundalk in the Irish Republic, was serving a 14-year sentence for supplying two mobile phones used in the attack, in which 29 people were killed and more than 200 injured.

The Court of Criminal Appeal in Dublin ruled Murphy's conviction for conspiring to cause an explosion was unsafe because of the way a lower court dealt with information that police had changed interview notes and given false evidence.

Two detectives were charged this month with perjury relating to evidence they gave during the trial.

It also said the court breached Murphy's right to be presumed innocent until proved guilty by taking into account previous convictions.

Families of the bomb victims criticised the appeal court's decision.

"Myself as a victim, and I'm sure the other victims, are very disappointed with the outcome of this -- it's very disheartening," said Godfrey Wilson, whose 15-year-old daughter Lorraine was killed.

Victor Barker, whose 12-year-old son James died in the blast, told Reuters: "It's a step back for all the families, and I think it would be a disaster if this case against Murphy was set aside solely because of inappropriate conduct on the part of the Garda (Irish police)."

The Real IRA, a splinter faction of the Irish Republican Army guerrilla group, detonated a 225kg car bomb in the market town of Omagh on a busy Saturday afternoon seven years ago.

No one has ever been charged with murder over the bombing but relatives of some of the victims are suing five people, including Murphy, in a Belfast court.

The Omagh bombing shook Northern Ireland's peace process, then seemingly on the road to resolution with the signing of the "Good Friday" peace deal a few months earlier.

That accord largely ended 30 years of violence between the British province's warring Catholic and Protestant communities and paved the way to a local assembly in which power was shared between the two.

The assembly was suspended in 2002 and direct rule from London resumed.

- REUTERS