John White
John White is a prominent loyalist and alleged informer.
Killings
In 1978 , White received a life sentence after he admitted the 1973 killings of SDLP politician Paddy Wilson and civil servant Irene Andrews. Wilson was shot and stabbed 32 times and Andrews stabbed 19 times in what a judge called "a frenzied attack, a psychotic outburst." The killing had been claimed by the Ulster Freedom Fighters (UFF), a cover name for the Ulster Defence Association (UDA) of which White was a member.[1]
Political career
White was released from prison in 1992, and went on to become a prominent member of the UDA-aligned Ulster Democratic Party. He served on the party's Stormont talks team and met John Major in Downing Street in 1996.[2]
White was closely associated with loyalist figure Johnny Adair and was forced to leave Northern Ireland in February 2003, following a feud between Adair's "C Company" on the lower Shankill and other sections of the UDA.[3]
Alleged informer
In February 2006, Brian Rowan reported that White had been recruited as an informer after leaving prison.
- A senior intelligence source said during the summer of 2004 that White was an informer ? a covert human intelligence source.
- And his coded details are believed to have been among those stolen in the robbery at Special Branch offices at Castlereagh in March 2002.
- In recent days, another senior security source appeared to confirm White's role as a Special Branch informer.
- Asked if there was any doubt in his mind about what was being suggested, he replied: "Not a lot."[4]
At an SDLP seminar in March 2008, Rowan questioned the use that the security forces had made of White:
- White, says Rowan, was responsible for pushing aside political figures such as Gary McMichael and Davy Adams – both widely seen as peace-makers within loyalism at the time of the 1994 ceasefires. White has been a close associate of the infamous Johnny Adair, a loyalist paramilitary alleged to have been responsible for numerous deaths and who was at the heart of repeated violent feuds within loyalism. Rowan seems to suggest that Special Branch was active in pulling the strings of this 'puppet' in pursuance of its own objectives.[5]
Notes
- ↑ David McKittrick, Seamus Kelters, Brian Feeney, Chris Thornton, and David McVea, Lost Lives, Mainstream Publishing, 2004, pp.371-374.
- ↑ David McKittrick, Seamus Kelters, Brian Feeney, Chris Thornton, and David McVea, Lost Lives, Mainstream Publishing, 2004, pp.371-374.
- ↑ Brian Rowan, Loyalist White a police informer: Special Branch recruited killer, Belfast Telegraph, 21 February 2006.
- ↑ Brian Rowan, Loyalist White a police informer: Special Branch recruited killer, Belfast Telegraph, 21 February 2006.
- ↑ Patrick Corrigan, Brian Rowan and the curious case of the 'dirty war', Belfast and Beyond blog, Amnesty International, 1 April 2009.
