Irish Republican News · August 22, 2008

British soldiers observed murder of teenager

A Police Ombudsman investigation into the murder of Belfast teenager Damien Walsh will confirm British soldiers watched the killing by the unionist paramilitary UDA and did not intervene, it has been reported.

The Ombudsman’s report into the 1993 murder in west Belfast will be published near the end of the year, but parts of it have already been seen by the Walsh family.

Sixteen-year-old Walsh worked the Dairy Farm shopping centre as a trainee coalman. On Thursday 25th March 1993, he and another workmate were working late. Just after eight o’clock, two UDA gunmen entered the premises and opened fire. Walsh was hit six times in the back in the lungs, heart, kidney and liver.

No one has ever been charged or made accountable for the murder or any other events connected with it.

The new report will reveal that undercover British soldiers watched the murder take place and were in radio contact with the RUC.

However, neither force moved in to prevent the killing or effect arrests. The report will particularly criticise the RUC police for failing to arrest the UDA killers as they made their getaway.

It has also been revealed that weapons and masks found in the getaway car were destroyed by the RUC. A DNA sample taken from one of the balaclavas has never been acted upon.

It has also emerged that the RUC allowed the owner of the getaway car, which was hijacked on the Shankill, to remove items from the vehicle after it was recovered.

Damien’s parents, Marian and Peter Walsh, said the more Ombudsman’s investigation continues, the more shocking the situation becomes.

“There can be no doubt there was collusion in my son’s murder,” said Mrs Walsh. “British soldiers sat and watched it take place and did nothing to intervene, and the RUC didn’t even try and intercept the killers after the shooting.”

Mrs Walsh is determined to see those involved in her son’s murder face a court - including RUC members and British soldiers.

“I want the policemen and soldiers who have covered this up and stalled the investigation to be charged as well,” she said.

“They are as responsible as the gunmen. They are war criminals in my mind. That’s how strongly I feel.”

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