Colin Cramphorn

1956-2006 Successively, Deputy Chief Constable of the Royal Ulster Constabulary, Acting Chief Constable of the Police Service of Northern Ireland and Chief Constable of West Yorkshire.

Stormontgate

In 2002, as Acting Chief Constable of the reformed Police Service of Northern Ireland, he presided over the critical early phases of a police operation that exposed an alleged IRA spy ring in the Northern Ireland Office – otherwise known as "Stormontgate".

Although elements in the Government and MI5 had been tempted to go easy on this investigation for the sake of the peace process, Cramphorn was undeterred: though he accepted the inevitability of politics, he was thoroughly unaffected by it. The ensuing arrests resulted in the collapse of the devolved executive and despite repeated efforts by the British and Irish governments, it has still not been re-constituted.