Bloody Sunday internee blasts inquiry, imprisonment

The only person to have been convicted in connection with Bloody Sunday today branded the new Inquiry into the killing of 13 civil rights demonstrators in Derry in 1972 as “a farce”.

Martin ‘Ducksy’ Doherty served 44 days in prison after refusing to give evidence to the Inquiry. The Derryman has always insisted he was not in the Bogside on the day.

Mr Doherty also described conditions in Maghaberry Prison as “intolerable” for republican prisoners.

“I was strip-searched five-times. There’s a bigger issue and it’s about the treatment of republican prisoners in Maghaberry.”

Mr Doherty claimed that republican inmates are locked up for long periods and are forced to eat meals “facing the toilet”.

An exercise yard at the prison was described by Mr Doherty as “a budgie cage” and he also criticised a lack of educational resources.

Mr Doherty described the Saville Inquiry into the Derry massacre as “Widgery Two”, a reference to the original Britsh inqauiry into the massacre, widely considered to have been a whitewash.

The prisoner also said that he refused to sign the “compact for separated prisoners”, a glossy pamphlet handed for signing by prison authorities.

It reads, “You have asked to be held in separate conditions. As a separated prisoner you will be unlocked for set periods each morning, afternoon and evening, except Sunday evening when all prisoners in Maghaberry are locked in their cells.”

There are currently 27 republican prisoners held in Maghaberry.

Urgent Appeal