On 24 May 1984,
Deputy Chief Constable John Stalker of the
Greater Manchester Police opened an inquiry into allegations that a specially trained undercover RUC team known as the "
Headquarters Mobile Support Unit" had carried out a "shoot-to-kill" policy in three distinct cases: • 11 November 1982: The killing of three unarmed IRA members, Eugene Toman, Sean Burns and Gervaise McKerr, at an RUC checkpoint in east
Lurgan,
County Armagh. Three officers were acquitted of their murder in June 1984, the presiding judge, Lord Justice
Maurice Gibson, commending them for their "courage and determination in bringing the three deceased men to justice – in this case, to the final court of justice." • 24 November 1982: The killing, by an RUC undercover unit, of Michael Tighe and the wounding of his friend
Martin McCauley at an IRA arms cache on a farm near
Lurgan,
County Armagh. (19 years later, McCauley was arrested in Colombia, accused by the Colombian authorities of teaching
FARC guerillas in the use of explosives, in particular the "
barrack buster"). • 12 December 1982: The killing at an RUC checkpoint in Mullacreavie,
County Armagh, of two INLA members,
Seamus Grew and Roddy Carroll. (The intended main target,
Dominic McGlinchey, was not in their car as expected.) The shootings were initially investigated by other members of the RUC, and the
Director of Public Prosecutions for Northern Ireland decided to bring prosecutions. At the first trial, relating to the shootings of the two INLA men, Constable John Robinson admitted to having been instructed to lie in his statements, and that other witnesses had similarly altered their stories to provide justification for opening fire on Grew and Carroll. When Robinson was found not guilty, the resulting public outcry caused RUC
Chief Constable John Hermon to ask John Stalker to investigate the killings. On 5 June 1986, just before Stalker was to make his final report, he was removed from his position in charge of the inquiry. On 30 June, he was suspended from duty over allegations of association with criminals. On 22 August, he was cleared of the allegations and returned to duty, although he was not reinstated as head of the inquiry. The inquiry was taken over by Colin Sampson of the
West Yorkshire Police. Its findings were never made public. In the book
Stalker, published by Stalker in 1988, the following descriptions of his investigation into the three shooting incidents appeared, concerning the McKerr, Toman and Burns shooting: Concerning the three incidents as a whole, Stalker wrote: According to
The Times of 9 February 1988, Stalker stated that although he never found written evidence of a shoot-to-kill policy, there was a "clear understanding" that officers were expected to enforce it. In 1990 the RUC issued a response to Stalker's book, saying that the book contained many inaccuracies and distortions and gave a misleading impression. In particular it stated, in contradiction to Stalker's assertions, that: • it was wrong to allege that the three investigations were carried out under different detectives as the same detective superintendent was in charge of two of the investigations • the investigation files were presented to the Director of Public Prosecutions in the format approved by him • it was already established in a police statement of 13 November 1982 that no police officer had been struck by the car driven by Gervaise McKerr • it had been advisable, for the safety of the three officers, that they leave the scene immediately • their weapons had been seized without delay by the scene of crimes officers • no incorrect information was given to the investigating officers concerning where the shooting occurred, although uniformed officers had mistakenly positioned the tape on the junction and it was repositioned accurately shortly afterwards • although it was accepted that all the cartridges were not recovered, due to the torrential rain at the time some could have been washed down the drains; the area had nonetheless been swept over for two days with metal detectors. Criticisms were also made that Stalker had gone outside his remit to reinvestigate the shooting incidents as well as a terrorist incident on 27 October 1982 in which three police officers had been killed and that his report, when submitted, lacked the clarity and precision normally associated with criminal investigations. The government also submitted that, on 23 June 1992, John Thorburn (the number two on Stalker's inquiry team), when withdrawing a libel action against the RUC Chief Constable, had made a statement in which he took the opportunity to submit publicly that he was satisfied that the RUC had not pursued a shoot-to-kill policy in 1982 and that the RUC Chief Constable had not condoned or authorised any deliberate or reckless killings by his officers. Other members of the Stalker/Sampson inquiry team also stated in June 1990 that "the Greater Manchester officers wish to stress that the Stalker/Sampson Enquiry found no evidence of a 'Shoot to Kill policy'". == Court rulings ==