Originally Posted by Pauls9 (Post 35647093)

If this happened, I can see it being regretted in the future. Future improvements in detection techniques are likely to make it easier to identify miscreants. The simple existence of the amnesty is likely to lead to people coming forward with evidence or confessions.

Originally Posted by Osem (Post 35647091)

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-northern-ireland-24999051

Seems a bit odd that this is being proposed given we're currently involved in investigating and prosecuting all manner of people in respect of abuse allegations (some questionable) dating back to the 1960's.

Originally Posted by martyh (Post 35647526)

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-24987465

Hopefully an end to Prosecutions will stop us turning on our own.

It is time that the troubles in NI where put to bed and people moved on

Originally Posted by Osem (Post 35647641)

True but I can't see that happening if this plan goes ahead. In fact I can see it backfiring and causing more grief and people are deprived of legal justice and turn to their own variety.

People do need to move on but, just like the Nazis who fled justice, those on both sides who've bombed, killed, maimed etc. need to know that they will be wanted until their dying day.

Originally Posted by martyh (Post 35647693)

The Nazis didn't the Good Friday Agreement to protect them though .We have already let loads of bombers and murderers out of jail under that agreement so how can we possibly prosecute others and expect them to go to jail

Originally Posted by martyh (Post 35647125)

As part of the peace process we are not allowed to gather evidence relating to murders by the ira or examine any of the weapons forensically or examine any of the "disappeared" other than to identify them ,so with most of any evidence unavailable to us it is quite pointless pursuing anyone

Originally Posted by Mr Angry (Post 35647748)

Wrong.

"In a February 2008 it was confirmed in the House of Commons that the Historical Enquiries Team (HET) was to examine all deaths attributed to The Troubles from January 1969 to the Good Friday Agreement in 1998, equating to 3,268 deaths which occurred in 2,516 incidents (an incident is described as a case). At that time 1,039 cases had been allocated to the HET business process. The team currently has a total of 175 staff."

Originally Posted by martyh (Post 35647820)

We cannot test decommissioned weapons to forensically link them to crimes

If a body(one of the disapeared) is discovered or the IRA tell us where one is we cannot examine that body other than to identify it

John Larkin has said that so much evidence or potential evidence has been made unavailable for use then the next logical step would be to not prosecute anything from before the good friday agreement

http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b03hmpx5

skip through to 6mins in

Originally Posted by Mr Angry (Post 35647830)

Yes, quite.

I was pointing out that your assertion"As part of the peace process we are not allowed to gather evidence relating to murders by the ira ..." was wrong.

Additionally, the remit of the HET is not restricted to murders committed by the IRA. It also investigates murders by loyalist paramilitaries. In recent years its emphasis has been focused on murders carried out by means of state collusion and by the security forces.

As far as I am aware this position is simply Larkins position and he has not consulted at victim, ministerial or Governmental level before going public with his thoughts.

Originally Posted by martyh (Post 35647846)

Well according to the Attorney General there are a lot of restrictions so it would not be worth pursuing prosecutions.

Originally Posted by martyh (Post 35647846)

What about a Truth and Reconciliation Commission similar to the one in South Africa ,maybe that is the way forward

Originally Posted by Mr Angry (Post 35647860)

Here's a very interesting point regarding the statement “This means that crucial forensic evidence, pivotal to securing convictions, cannot even be obtained, let alone used in court. As a result, the chance of victims’ families getting justice in the form of a criminal conviction is low and getting lower.”

That point is that there were dozens, if not hundreds, of successful prosecutions for terrorist murders in Northern Ireland where ballistics evidence was not "crucial” to conviction. What has suddenly changed? Why this sudden urgency & will to move on and "forget" the past on the part of our judiciary? Anyone would think they are trying to avoid something.



This has been mooted (most voiciferously by Sinn Fein) many, many times and dismissed each time by the principal Unionist / Loyalist parties. I don't know that we'll ever get to the bottom of a lot of what went on but there are a lot of people, on various sides, who will do their level best to stop the truth coming out.

Originally Posted by martyh (Post 35647875)

“More than 15 years have passed since the Belfast agreement, there have been very few prosecutions, and every competent criminal lawyer will tell you the prospects of conviction diminish, perhaps exponentially, with each passing year, so we are in a position now where I think we have to take stock,” he said.

Originally Posted by fatmat8 (Post 35649885)

and of course the bid winners in all this will be the legal teams . now there is a suprise .