Republican News · Thursday 28 March 2002

Bradley drugs call rejected

Derry Sinn Féin Policing Spokesperson Colr Paul Fleming has slammed as ludicrous calls by the Deputy Chair of the Policing Board, Dennis Bradley, that community groups work with the PSNI to tackle the drugs issue.

"It is ludicrous for Dennis Bradley to advise community groups to work with this discredited force to tackle the drugs issue when we know for a fact that RUC Special Branch has protected drug dealers in exchange for information," said Fleming.

"It is a matter of public record that Special Branch allowed informants a free hand in the drugs trade and allowed loyalist paramilitaries involved in drugs to operate free from the threat of arrest. Indeed, the former head of the RUC Drugs Squad, Kevin Sheehy, admitted publicly that Special Branch had prevented the arrest of drug dealers because they were informants.

"In this light, how then can Dennis Bradley ask local community groups to work with the PSNI whilst the Special Branch continue as an unaccountable force within a force, and as events in Strabane last week exposed, are actively recruiting informers within our communities.

"Is Dennis Bradley actually proposing that community groups seek to put the PSNI and their Special Branch bosses in touch with the most vulnerable sections of our communities?"