McFadden family ‘refuse MI5 protection’

Saoradh have said the family of Dennis McFadden have ended their associations with the recently identified MI5 agent, and they should face no hostility or recrimination for his actions.

Following raids and arrests last week, a total of nine Saoradh activists are currently behind bars on the basis of bugged meetings organised by McFadden, who worked with MI5 for “personal profit” according to the party, and has now fled his home in Glengormley, outside Belfast.

Saoradh said the family has been in regular contact with the party since McFadden admitted his role to them, after which they were beset by agents looking to move them away.

“Since the entrapment case occurred, this MI5 agent has contacted his family to admit what he is, sent his handlers to their doors and MI5 even attempted to kidnap them into ‘protective custody’ – which they resisted and refused,” Saoradh said.

“It is the opinion of his immediate family that McFadden cares for no one but himself and the personal profit resulting from his actions. Not those who he has imprisoned in this dirty snare. Not their distraught family members who welcomed him into their homes as a friend. And not even his own family.”

Active in republican circles for over 20 years, it is thought McFadden could now become the North’s latest ‘supergrass’, offering testimony in a large-scale court trial in return for cash.

A Sinn Fein activist in County Antrim in the early 2000s, McFadden went on to found a potential MI5 front organisation known as ‘Justice Watch Ireland’. Defunct since around 2013, it sought to work with the campaign for the release of the Craigavon 2 as well as other justice campaigns.

McFadden was known to attend a large number of republican functions across Ireland on a regular basis and was also involved in other projects and campaigns. Ultimately becoming a member of the Saoradh national executive, enabling him to organise the meetings at which leading members were last week accused by the PSNI of having ‘directed terrorism’.

According to the Saoradh website, the McFadden family said they were “disgusted” by his actions and want no further association with him.

“Just as our imprisoned comrades and their families are victims of the presence of MI5 in Occupied Ireland, so too has the family of Dennis McFadden been betrayed,” they said.

“Saoradh stands with them just as we stand with our comrades and their families here at home.

“Through Saoradh and the Republican Movement, the McFadden family want to highlight the fact that they are now being haunted by MI5 on a daily basis, in order that the spooks can try to smother their latest operation in Britain’s dirty war.

“Saoradh would like to place on public record that the wider McFadden family should face no negativity, threats, coercion or any other recriminations from Republicans or others for the sins of their former family member.”

Urgent Appeal