PSNI spying on Noah investigator

The PSNI’s hostile treatment of the nationalist community has been brought home with the news that a journalist examining the force’s handling of the death of 14-year-old schoolboy Noah Donohoe has been subjected to intrusive and direct surveillance.

Noah’s naked body was found deep inside a storm drain in a loyalist area of north Belfast in June 2020, almost a week after he’d gone missing. Almost five years later after his shocking death, major questions remain unanswered ahead of an inquest which the coroner has said he hopes will begin before the summer.

Numerous issues have already been exposed in the PSNI’s failure to properly investigate the apparent abduction and murder of a child who was seen on camera, naked and in apparent distress, on the day of his disappearance.

The case has been compared to that of Lisa Dorrian, a 25-year-old woman who disappeared in 2005 amid a code of silence by the unionist paramilitary UVF, as well as more recent sectarian attacks against nationalist youths in the area.

Intense public concern helped support an investigation by journalist Donal MacIntyre, who was immediately placed under significant surveillance by the PSNI. It has not denied spying on the journalist, nor will it say if it has stopped.

The spy operation on Mr McIntyre is believed to have begun in August 2023. It is in line with the police surveillance of other journalists with links to the nationalist community, as well as the hostile treatment by the authorities of Noah’s grieving family.

Mr MacIntyre said has “disappointed but not shocked” by the reports.

“It is shocking that the trigger for this alleged online and perhaps other monitoring was my team’s investigation into the Noah Donohoe case, which is supported by thousands of small donations from people who were not confident in the competence of the PSNI to investigate the full circumstances around Noah’s death.”

He added: “It is possible that in accessing my online activity, if true, then private communications between myself and Noah’s mother, Fiona, may have been accessed.”

The journalist said that aside from journalistic interference, the possibility that the PSNI may have spied on Noah’s mother was alarming.

Mr MacIntyre has also revealed that he suspected the police were behind a break-in of his car when it was in a long stay car park at Heathrow Airport in London.

He said that cash, and other valuable items weren’t taken — but “very sensitive” documentation relating to his investigation was scattered all over the back seat.

The PSNI has already admitted breaking the law in its treatment of two other journalists. In 2020, it paid £875,000 to Trevor Birney, Barry McCaffrey and Fine Point Films for unlawfully arrest and the seizure of journalistic material about the Loughinisland massacre by loyalist paramilitaries in collusion with British forces. That exposed a web of unlawful surveillance of journalists and lawyers which continues to unravel.

Protests against the PSNI have been accelerating in nationalist areas.

Republicans were forcibly removed from a Craigavon conference centre last Thursday, February 27, where a ‘Policing and Community Safety Partnership’ meeting had been taking place. It was the fourth demonstration at a PSNI public relations event within a week.

In a social media post, Noah’s aunt and justice campaigner, Niamh Donohoe, warned that state bodies had “grossly miscalculated” the fallout of the handling and cover-up in Noah’s case.

“To have obliterated all public trust in policing is a precarious place for the North to be in. People are preparing to take to the streets in their thousands over this latest development.

“Justice must be seen to be done!!! Those responsible for Noah’s death must be held accountable and those responsible for hiding the truth must be exposed.

“There can be no peace without Justice. We will never stop”.

While Sinn Féin continues to support the force, North Belfast MP John Finucane has called for a full investigation of the latest allegations, warning the PSNI have been “more interested in identifying journalistic sources than investigating crime”.

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