Northern Ireland print journalism has for many years been dull and lethargic – investigative or research-based journalism is left to one or two television programs.
Northern Ireland journalism has also become very politically biased – particularly on the nationalist side.
To give just one instance, following the revelation that the Pat Finucane Centre’s Director [Paul O’Connor] for many years had hidden his IRA past – his involvement in shootings, bombings and in the murder of IRA Volunteer James ‘Jim’ O’Hagan in August of 1971 – and even with the publication of photographs of O’Connor with weapons in the Bogside, even in light of the fact that O’Connor had later been ordered out of Derry by the IRA – not a single local journalist developed the story after this blog’s intial post about O’Connor…
The fact that O’Connor had been arrested, interrogated and released by the RUC in April of 1971 following his wealthy family’s powerful influence with then RUC Chief Frank Lagan – later there were papers in the Bloody Sunday tribunal referring to “Paul O’Connor” – an arrested [IRA source] nicknamed “the scholar” – clearly referring to Paul O’Connor as a student of Strand Road Technical College when first arrested and later released…
Not one journalist challenged the many Directors of the Pat Finucane Centre about O’Connor’s promotion to his own Director’s role, if they had known of his IRA terrorist background and involvement in the murder of IRA Volunteer Jim O’Hagan, how they felt about damage to the Centre’s national and international reputation following his admission of years of lies and deception.
O’Connor had gone on the run minutes after the murder of Jim O’Hagan and then spent a year as an IRA gunman, bomber and “Company O.C.” in “Free Derry” in the Bogside before he was kicked out of Derry by the Derry Brigade of the IRA – returning to Derry years later untroubled and untouched by the RUC even after his much photographed and publicised IRA activities and the murder of Jim O’Hagan…
Which Directors of the Centre had backed O’Connor from the beginning and still did so?
How did the Finucane family feel after finding out that the Pat Finucane Centre’s Director had been a deceitful IRA terrorist gunman and bomber, hiding his involvement in the murder of an IRA Volunteer?
Nobody knows because nobody asked – you have to hand it to Journalists Speaking Truth to Power But Not About The IRA…
BBC Radio Foyle never reported the story at all, even when in the morning radio review of newspapers they managed NOT to notice it on the front page of The Irish News.
The local “Derry Journal” newspaper never reported the story at all – no surprise there…
Certain IRA and Sinn Féin stories must be left alone – there are few if any instances of local print journalists “speaking truth to power” when it comes to the edifice of Sinn Féin IRA – that’s just the way it is on the nationalist side.
And so lazy, lethargic journalism reported that Edward ‘Ted’ Howell was actually a brainiac anti-sectarian peacemaker without whom IRA leader Gerry Adams couldn’t strategise wiping his posterIRAr.
Sticky ‘Ted’ and Billy McMillen
Howell’s early Sticky [Official IRA] days alongside Billy McMillen were hardly mentioned.
That Howell was ordered to join the early Provisional IRA by McMillen to report back regularly on the breakaway movement – never mentioned.
That Howell later “went native” in the Provos and fell in with Gerry-I-Was-Nivver-A-Member-Of-The-IRA-Adams.
But Howell as a Non-Sectarian Peacemaker? Seriously?
Canadian/United States Border Arrest
If Edward ‘Ted’ Howell was a PeaceNik Pacifist Non-Sectarian IRA terrorist – how so?
A full decade after the Provisional IRA’s early 1970s mass-casualty anti-civilan bombings, sectarian murders of innocent Protestants, abductions, summary executions and ‘disappearance’ of corpses – a full decade later into the 1980s our PeaceNik Pacifist Howell led an IRA group determined to secure more sophisticated weapons, arms and ammunition for the IRA in the United States (via Canada) so that the IRA could increase its kill rate in Ireland, Britain and even in Europe.
And Howell turned out to be an unmitigated disaster for the IRA from February 1982.
He and four others, including IRA bombmaker Dessie Ellis [who initially used a false name ‘Michael Weir’] were arrested by American Immigration and Naturalization Service agents at Buffalo, Niagara Falls, attempting to enter the United States on the weapons’ procurement mission.
A sophisticated weapons’ shopping list, thousands of dollars in cash, false documentation and “casting dies resembling those used by Irish Government to validate passports” were found on the men.
Critically for authorities in the United States, Howell was carrying a notebook containing names that authorities suspected included leading IRA members linked to gun-running.
In particular, Howell had the name of a Belfast-born New York bartender – Gabriel Megahey – who was suspected by the FBI of gunrunning to the IRA.
A short time after Howell’s arrest, the FBI placed a wiretap on Megahey’s home phone in Queens, New York, and in a later ‘sting’ operation Megahey told an FBI agent he was indeed the head of the IRA in America with access to $1M for arms’ purchases.
Within 2 years of Howell’s detention at Niagara Falls, Gabriel Megahey was sentenced in September 1984 to a surprisingly short 7 years in a federal penitentiary for conspiracy to ship arms to the IRA – a 7 years that could be substantially cut by good behaviour – or even by a ‘deal’ with the FBI.
It was thanks to Howell’s papers that the FBI smashed the IRA gunrunning gang.
While Gabriel Megahey’s deportation from the US was later halted in the name of the ‘peace process‘, he had initially hidden from the American authorities then as now his 1962 criminal trial and conviction in Belfast for headbutting and killing 24yrs old Kevin McLaughin of Highbury Street.
Megahey had twice assaulted Kevin McLaughlin – once by headbutting him inside a chip shop on the Crumlin Road – after which he knocked him to the ground outside causing a fatal head injury.
Megahey was sentenced to 2 years penal servitude, after which he moved to Southhampton, England, before entering the United States without admitting his criminal past.
Megahey was always likely to be subject to FBI pressure to inform – his unadmitted Belfast conviction could at any time have resulted in his expulsion from the United States.
Having made a career out of his American IRA days, Megahey recently published a boxing gloves’ photo of himself on Facebook, evidently having erased the memory of his headbutt and one-punch 1962 victim Kevin McLaughlin.
Megahey currently resides in Delaware.
There were so many Irish republicans on the FBI informer/deal books that it would surprise no-one if Megahey were to be outed as an FBI informant in the future.
Edward ‘Ted’ Howell’s blunders were far from over.
Barely four weeks after he was deported from Canada, he was observed by Special Branch detectives receiving a bag from IRA Chief of Staff, Joe Cahill, in a cafe in O’Connell Street in Dublin city centre.
When ‘Howler’ Howell left the cafe he was stopped and questioned by a detective, gave a false name and tried to run off with a plastic bag grabbed from the carrier bag.
Arrested immediately, Howell was found to be carrying $80,000 in the bag, with a further £350 in Sterling and £646 in Irish pounds.
Like Martin McGuinness and many other senior IRA persons at the time, Howell found that IRA activism put in his hands unimaginable amounts of untraced cash and a lifestyle of travel and pretend heroism which was a far cry from a mundane 9 to 5 job back in Northern Ireland.
Howell’s arrest in America on an abortive IRA gunrunning operation gave the authorities on both sides of the Atlantic his photograph, fingerprints and modus operandi – not forgetting a wealth of information about IRA operatives in Canada and the United States – and highlighted that he had become a liability to the IRA.
Special Branch detectives were easily able to shadow him later in Dublin and catch him receiving an enormous amount of cash from the IRA’s Chief of Staff.
There followed 4 years of court cases after which a sympathetic Dublin Circuit Court judge returned the cash – plus interest – to Joe Cahill.
Brainiac Howell didn’t notice Gabriel Megahey’s criminal past which the FBI might at any time have used to pressure him to inform on his far-off comrades, nor did Brainiac Howell ever manage to spot Denis Donaldson’s spying activities whether those were in the United States or back in Belfast or even in Stormont.
Nor did brainiac Howell spot the infiltration of the IRA’s ‘nutting squad’ by agents such a Freddie Scappaticci.
Since Howell’s bumbling blunders ended his activist days, why did Gerry Adams keep him on in any role, even in a so-called Think Tank – (even if confining Howell to a think tank was a kind of preventive detention)?
The primary reason Howell’s services were retained was that he professed the single quality that really mattered, namely uncritical loyalty to Gerry Adams.
Howell Anti-Sectarian?
When at the age of 20 I was imprisoned in Crumlin Road gaol in May 1975 – during the IRA ceasefire period – I was tasked by the IRA to act as the I.O. [intelligence officer] of the prison and the main duty involved debriefing newly arrived prisoners about what they had or had not said in RUC interrogations – I then had to summarise these interviews on cigarette papers and smuggle them out to the IRA so that it would have the opportunity to engage in damage limitation.
It was as a result of one such interview that I discovered that the Belfast Brigade of the IRA was involved in a wholesale and SECRET sectarian murder campaign that targeted innocent Protestants on the streets of Belfast.
I sent a ‘comm’ to both the Belfast Brigade and to the Derry Brigade querying the Belfast Brigade’s murders of innocent Protestants – the Belfast Brigade’s response was swift – but let me fill in only a few details:
You will never have heard of Alan Raymond and Thomas Irvine, two young Protestant friends from Westland Way and Westland Road, Belfast.
They earned a few headlines toward the end of June in 1975 when they were both repeatedly shot in the back as they chatted on the street near their homes.
The two unmarried 22 year olds were dead before they reached hospital.
Their hobby was fishing and they were known in angling circles.
Their names and stories faded faster than their newsprint photographs.
But their sectarian murders – carried out by the Belfast Brigade of the IRA – uncovered a web of deceit spun by IRA leaders in Belfast and Dublin that has continued down the years.
Some of the IRA leaders from that period – including Gerry Adams – are still alive today and fit to enlighten victims and historians about the IRA’s sectarian murder campaign in which many entirely innocent Protestant civilians were shot dead for their religion.
The Gunman
Robert “Cheeser” Crawford – or Robert John Martin Crawford as newspapers described him – was an 18 year old IRA volunteer from Glenview Street, The Bone, North Belfast.
Robert Crawford was an apprentice bricklayer who rode the bus to work every morning at 7.30am – this fact led to his identification and conviction.
A young girl rode the same bus every morning and knew him by sight over many months.
Crawford usually wore long shorts, Doc Martens boots and a Bay City Roller tank top – he looked much younger than his 18 years when he was arrested and remanded to prison.
The Murders
Crawford stepped out of a gold-coloured Cortina car on Westland Road with another gunman.
They walked behind Thomas and Alan who were chatting and suddenly opened fire.
Thomas Irvine was hit by three bullets.
Alan Raymond was hit by four bullets.
Both fell to the ground dying.
Crawford fired a few more rounds – one of which richocheted and hit the face of a teenager among a group of others sitting on a nearby wall.
One of the teenagers was the girl who rode the same bus as Robert Crawford every morning and she recognised him immediately, but did not know his name.
The police later watched the morning bus and arrested Robert Crawford for double murder.
Crawford ‘broke in interrogation’ and made a full statement to the Royal Ulster Constabulary.
In his statement, Crawford claimed [as ordered to do so by the IRA] that he was a “freelancer” – a non-aligned gunman not associated with any known paramiltary organisation.
The IRA Debriefing in Crumlin Road Gaol
When newly arrested IRA volunteers were remanded to prison in the early 1970s they had to declare to the prison authorities the paramilitary faction to which they belonged so that they could be allocated to the correct wing of the prison largely controlled by their paramilitary group.
Robert Crawford declared that he was Provisional IRA and came on to ‘A’ Wing where I was – at that time for a short time – the IRA’s Intelligence Officer whose duty it was to interview newly arrived prisoners about their police interrogation.
Everyone watched the television news and read the papers about the violence taking place on the streets of Belfast outside Crumlin Road prison – everyone was aware that two Protestants had been shot dead a few evenings before – the question was:
Were they Loyalist Paramilitaries?
I had been arrested the previous month in Derry/Londonderry.
I had been the Derry Brigade IRA Explosives Officer, alongside Martin McGuinness and other well-known IRA members.
At previous meetings of the Derry Brigade, questions had sometimes been asked about the number of shootings in Belfast in particular – the question had been:
Who are the victims?
The answer given by Tommy Mellon (Brigade O.C.) and Martin McGuinness (Brigade Adjutant, but also GHQ Staff) was that they were Loyalist paramilitaries only.
This answer had served to kill off the questions – I had believed the answer.
When I began to question Robert Crawford, I asked him:
Me: Did you shoot the two Loyalist paramilitaries the other evening on Westland Road?
Crawford answered with some bravado:
Crawford: I STIFFED THE FIRST TWO ORANGIES I SAW…
Me: You mean Loyalist paramilitaries?
Crawford: NO, THE FIRST TWO PROTESTANTS I SAW.
Crawford: I WAS ORDERED TO CLAIM I WAS A ‘FREELANCER’ IF I WAS ARRESTED AND CHARGED.
I was in a kind of shock – and as the conversation continued with Crawford, it was abundantly clear that the Belfast Brigade was running a sectarian murder campaign while telling other IRA Brigade areas that it was actually killing Loyalist paramilitaries – and this was a total lie…
The IRA volunteers being sent out to murder innocent Protestant civilians were being told to claim to police that they were ‘freelancers‘ – non-aligned paramilitaries who magically came up with guns, ammunition, cars and helpers…
The ‘freelancer‘ claim only counted for the police interrogation period and any signed statements – as soon as the shooters arrived in prison, they could then claim IRA membership and be allocated to the IRA wing of the prison.
The Repercussions
At age 20, I was headstrong and had the shreds of some idealism.
I wrote up Robert Crawford’s debriefing statement on cigarette papers and had it smuggled out to the Belfast Brigade of the IRA.
Along with his statement, I asked the Belfast Brigade if it was true that it was murdering innocent Protestant civilians…
I also sent a note to the Derry Brigade of the IRA informing it that the Belfast Brigade appeared to be full scale murdering innocent Protestants.
The Belfast Brigade IRA response was swift.
Chief of Staff of Cumann na mBan and then member of the IRA’s Army Council [the women’s wing of the IRA] Maura Drumm arrived in the prison on a “special visit” – these visits were allowed to prominent republicans by the prison authorities.
She informed me:
“You are stood down – you are no longer the Intelligence Officer of the prison.”
In a moment, I was not only fired from my IRA position, I was also declared to be in some sense not trustworthy before my IRA comrades.
The O.C. of the prison at that time was a big ignorant Tyrone IRA volunteer, Stan Corrigan – he paid no attention to the matter of innocent Protestants being murdered by the IRA and carried on as if it and my being ‘stood down’ never happened.
The Derry Brigade of the IRA never replied to my ‘comm’.
Ted Howell – Absent Silent Anti-Sectarian Terrorist
So when I as a former Derry Brigade Explosives Officer raised with the Belfast Brigade a challenge to its campaign of sectarian murders of innocent Protestant civilians – where was very important brainiac Edward Ted Howell to back me up and raise an anti-sectarian fuss?
Nowhere to be seen or heard.
Calling on the IRA to Ditch the Armed Struggle – 1978
Fortunately for me, in early September of 1975 I was released at Townhall Street Magistrates Court, re-arrested outside and flown to London to answer for London bombing charges.
This removed me from the clutches of the Belfast Brigade of the IRA that was unwilling to have a dissident questioner about the place…
Two years later, I finally resigned publicly from the IRA and penned letters of apology to my victims – a matter that caused the IRA prisoners in the English prisons to “blank” me for the next 8 years before I was transferred back to Northern Ireland.
Where was Edward Ted Howell when in 1978 I publicly challenged the IRA to ditch the Armed Struggle and engage in solely democratic politics?
Nowhere to be seen or heard.
But 4 years later, Howell led the arms procurement gang to Canada and then, unsuccessfully, into the United States.
We have arrived at the point where the IRA leadership may claim that every Tom, Dick and Harry – not forgetting Ted and Gerry – were Peacemakers and Peace Strategists – and lazy local journalists regurgitate this rubbish pap on behalf of SF NI without any bothersome research or investigation to determine the truth of it.
Robert Crawford POW?
Robert Crawford was released ‘on licence’ in 1990 after 15 years in prison.
He immediately returned to IRA active service.
Four years later, Crawford was arrested along with Gerry Adams’ cousin, Davy Adams, Paul Stitt, Gerard Bradley and Patrick Donaghy.
Captured in a stolen van with two loaded rifles, a loaded pistol and a ‘coffee jar bomb’, Crawford at first claimed to be a Loyalist paramilitary called Billy Wilson from the Shankill Road.
In 1995 he was convicted along with others and sentenced to 25 more years in prison.
The deceitful Belfast Agreement earned Crawford and pals an early release a short few years later.
In 2014, Sinn Féin IRA presented Robert Crawford at an IRA commemoration in The Bone, Belfast, as a ‘former Irish Republican POW‘ to read a statement – the video is on YouTube.
How is it possible that Robert Crawford – murderer of two innocent Protestant civilians – is presented as a Prisoner of War by Sinn Féin IRA?
It is only possible because of the secret amnesty deals granted to the IRA by the Irish, British and American governments which have led to the cover up of the IRA’s many Human Rights atrocities – the murders of children, women and men over three decades.
It is only possible also because not a single journalist has challenged “Cheeser” Crawford (and his Belfast Brigade commanders) about his role in the IRA’s little discussed Sectarian Murder Campaign against innocent Protestant civilians.
Edward Ted Howell Peace Strategist?
I was released from Maghaberry Prison in September 1989 to go directly to Trinity College, Dublin
I had only been in Maghaberry for 2 years and yet I had been unwittingly instrumental in its opening as a “mixed, conforming” prison for paramilitaries who wanted nothing further to do with their respective paramilitary organisations.
When I was transferred back from the English prisons in 1985 after 10 years there, I had refused to go on the IRA’s controlled wings of the H-Blocks of Long Kesh – thereby again unwittingly giving rise to the first ‘mixed wings’ of loyalist and republican paramilitaries in the H-Blocks before the new Maghaberry prison later opened its doors.
As first of all a trickle of prisoners joined me – leaving their paramilitary wings – then later dozens and later again scores of paramilitary prisoners walked off the paramilitary controlled wings to join me on the first ‘mixed wing’.
The IRA inside and outside saw the flow of IRA prisoners to the mixed wings seeking release at last from prison as a major threat to its prison backbone.
Martin McGuinness – who had ‘blanked’ me for some 12 years since I publicly resigned from the IRA – agreed to give me an interview for Hot Press magazine in March 1990 about a potential Peace Process, in which he agreed to speak as an IRA leader offering Peace Talks. Read the Hot Press article at the link in the above line.
That seminal interview is where McGuinness admitted it was game over and he [and the IRA] was suing for a Peace Deal.
So important was the interview that I was brought onto the nighttime RTE News at 9 o’clock to talk about it.
Next day, I received a call from Jim Fitzpatrick of The Irish News asking if I sincerely believed McGuinness was seeking a way out.
But more interesting is that Michael Mansergh not only read the article, but also marked it and sent it off for the attention of An Taoiseach.
His annotated copy of the Hot Press article is viewable in the National Archives at this link – still marked ‘Dr. Mansergh – SEEN BY TAOISEACH’.
It was obviously Game Over for the IRA’s Armed Struggle bar the shouting and minor details…
So, what’s all this nonsense about the efforts of Deep Throat Strategists such as Ted Howler Howell when both governments were immediately willing to give the IRA an amnesty and buckets of dosh for jacking it all in?
And when one ex-prisoner and ex-IRA Volunteer detailed the IRA’s pleading for a Peace Deal in March of 1990 in – of all high-brow publications – Niall Stokes’ Hot Press!
If you had eyes to see and ears to hear in 1989/1990, you could see that the IRA’s game of “Brits Out” and “Smash Stormont” was well and truly over.
All that bloodshed for an IRA that is now managing Brit Rule in Northern Ireland, on the Brit Payroll and for a Sinn Féin party that has now split into an SF NI and an SF FS (Free State) – every partitionist’s dream!
And you’re trying to tell me Howell was an essential player in this surrender years later?
Away with ye – and do your homework better in future obituaries of failed IRA terrorists.
The Irish Peace Process 