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Continua il processo contro Colin Duffy e Brian Shivers per Massereene Barracks

Massereene murder trial to go ahead

An attempt to have the case against two men accused of murdering two soldiers at Massereene Army base dropped has been refused by a judge.

Delivering his ruling at Belfast Crown Court, Mr Justice McLaughlin said that taking the Crown evidence at its height, “the prosecution case…justifies putting the defendants on trial on all counts”.

Colin Duffy, who is 43 and from Forest Glade in Lurgan and 45-year-old Brian Shivers from Sperrin Mews in Magherafelt, both deny murdering Sappers Patrick Azimkar and Mark Quinsey on 7 March 2009.

Both men also deny six charges of attempted murder and possessing the firearms used in the attack at Massereene Barracks in Antrim.

The two soldiers were killed in a hail of automatic gunfire while two other soldiers and two civilians were injured after a pizza had been delivered to the barracks.

At an earlier hearing, lawyers for Duffy and Shivers had argued that the evidence against them, taken at its best, was such that “no reasonable jury properly directed” could convict them.

Duffy’s DNA profile was found on the tip of a latex glove in the passenger footwell and on the passenger seat belt buckle of the Vauxhall Cavalier car used in the attack.

A DNA profile matching Shivers’ was uncovered on two match sticks in the car where it was partially burnt out on the Ranaghan Road in Randalstown, around seven miles from the scene of the fatal shooting.

Lawyers argued that it was not possible to date when the DNA was put there or even how it got there, submitting that it did not necessarily point to their involvement in the attack.

On Friday, Mr Justice McLaughlin said “key features” in the case against both defendants related to the reliance on the scientific evidence and any inferences to be drawn from it, adding that at this stage “it is inappropriate to to carry out a detailed analysis of this evidence”.

He said it was also important to bear in mind that the “full weight and effect” of the evidence could only been seen in the overall context of the facts and circumstances in which it is found”.

“I am satisfied that the proper approach to adopt here is to allow these cases each to go to trial so that the process of detailed scrutiny may be completed,” said the judge.

In refusing the application, he said that to evaluate the submissions would be “in effect indistinguishable from the trial process”.

Mr Justice McLaughlin told the court: “How each of the elements of evidence, particularly the strands of DNA evidence, fit into that overall picture cannot be determined at this preliminary stage.”

Duffy was remanded back into custody with Shivers released on continuing bail and the case was listed for mention next Friday.

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René Querin

Di professione grafico e web designer, sono appassionato di trekking e innamorato dell'Irlanda e della sua storia. Insieme ad Andrea Varacalli ho creato e gestisco Les Enfants Terribles.

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