Policing the community
By Mary Nelis
The topic for disscussion at the talks this week was
policing. In political terms it means that the parties
were discussing ways in which the RUC could be made
more acceptable to the nationalist community as part of
the overall agreement.
The debate, if indeed there was one, is timely, in
respect of the announcement by Jack Straw that Roisín
McAliskey would not be extradited to Germany because
medical evidence showed that such a move would be
unjust and oppressive.
Amidst the relief and joy felt by all right thinking
people at Straw's decision, the quiet words of Roisín's
solicitor Gareth Peirce, sent a cold chill through all
of us. Ms Peirce said that Roisín's weak mental state
had been caused by her treatment at the hands of the
RUC in Castlereagh Interrogation Centre.
She stated that her client was in effect ``given the
makings of a complete mental breakdown, by reason of
the interrogation process at Castlereagh.'' She asked,
``what is going on there, what is being allowed to
happen?''
What goes on at Castlereagh has exercised the minds of
many people for a long time. In recent weeks David
Adams was awarded £30,000 damages for criminal injuries
sustained during his incarceration there. The court
heard that the RUC took turns to jump Kung Fu style on
his legs. That's what goes on in Castlereagh, and
that's what has been going on since it first came into
being.
In their book, ``Justice under Fire'' a number of eminent
barristers detail some of the horror stories of arrests
and detention in Castlereagh in the late 70s. They
explain that in this specially constructed centre, the
RUC are given the goodwill of the political and
judicial authorities to embark on a programme of
interrogation which could only be described as
barbaric.
During those years police doctors working in places
like Castlereagh ignored the complaints of those being
held. Doctors who were brave enough to report cases of
serious physical assaults found that their reports were
either ignored or suppressed by the Diplock courts.
It was the Amnesty International report in 1979 which
finally broke the wall of silence, by declaring that
the RUC were systematically ill treating suspects to
the degree that a public inquiry was warranted.
The British government, compelled to act, set up the
Bennett committee. As with previous enquiries into the
conduct of the RUC such as Scarman, Hunt and Compton,
its conclusions produced no surprises. Bennett
investigated some 1,600 formal complaints of assault
which were backed up by independent medical evidence.
Its findings were sufficiently ``whitewashed'' to
exonerate the RUC from any culpability and not a single
RUC person was ever charged as a result of Bennett's
investigations.
It later emerged, during the early 80s, that while the
RUC were brutalising young men and women in
Castlereagh, Gough, and Strand barracks, Bennett was
producing his cover-up, the RUC community relations
branch were engaged in a ``charm offensive'' involving
schools, community groups, and senior citizens clubs.
Many will recall the ``Blue Lamp Disco's'', the adventure
camps, the top of the form quiz leagues and the
seminars with ``key people'', successfully exposed by An
Phoblacht and the Irish Times.
The thrust of this soft policing policy was to build up
psychological profiles of teenagers during the rambles
and the discos, with a view to recruiting them for the
force or as potential informers.
One of those successfully targeted during that period
was Raymond Gilmore, who was responsible for the arrest
and imprisonment of 35 men and women from Derry.
Gilmore was back in the news this week, to launch his
book, and advocate internment. He stated on the
Talkback programme that the RUC recruited him as a
police agent when he was 16 years old.
At the trial of those arrested on his information to
the RUC, Gilmore was described by the trial judge
Lowry, as a ``selfish man to whose lips a lie comes more
readily than the truth''.
To the RUC, he was but a tool, a useful weapon to use
against those whom they wished to take out of
circulation. As a tactic, the use of paid perjurers
eventually proved disastrous and the show trials
collapsed in failure.
But the policy of recruiting young people as spies and
informers continues along with brutality and
intimidation, to form the basis of the ``RUC policing in
the community strategy''. Its 90s version of the RUC
``Charm offensive'', is entiltled hands accross the
community. It involves frequent visits by RUC personnel
to schools, community and youth centres. ``Key people''
continue to collaborate in this programme, whose basic
aim is to make the RUC acceptable in the community
while they continue to build up and maintain
intelligence files on the individuals with whom they
come in contact.
Perhaps those involved might reflect on the quiet words
of Gareth Peirce, and ask themselves what kind of human
being would inflict such treatment on a pregnant woman,
to cause her a complete mental breakdown. Perhaps those
participants in the talks might ask themselves the same
question?
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