Devlin accused ‘saw something’
One of two north Belfast men accused of the brutal murder of schoolboy Thomas Devlin allegedly told a detective he had “seen something” the night of the fatal stabbing in August 2005.
Belfast Crown Court heard on Wednesday that Nigel James Brown, 26, from Whitewell Road, allegedly made the admission during a search of his then Ross House home in the north Belfast Mount Vernon flats complex.
The search took place in December that year, four months after Brown had been arrested, but then released without charge after being interviewed.
Detective John Kitchen said that in the flat Brown appeared “emotional”, and told him that he was “burning up” and couldn’t sleep at night.
Detective Kitchen said he asked Brown if there was something he wanted to say, and Brown allegedly told him: “I seen something and it’s cracking me up”.
However, later Brown asked the detective if what he had said would ever be used in a court, to which the detective said he could not promise it would not.
During this later conversation Brown allegedly replied: “You know I can’t say anything in court … look what happens in Northern Ireland when people talk to the police, the paramilitaries get them”.
Detective Kitchen said he got the impression that a sober, coherent and co-operative Brown wanted to say more, as if he wanted to get something off his chest.
During the earlier interviews, which were read to the court, Brown denied that he was afraid of his co-accused Gary Taylor, 23, from Mountcollyer Avenue, but who had also lived in Ross House at the time.
In the interviews Brown was shown CCTV footage of two men seen entering and leaving the flats on the night of the murder, but refused to say if Taylor was one of them.
The court also heard that Brown told police he had “gave away” the clothing he was wearing that night and that the only thing he knew about the schoolboy’s killing “was what was in the news and in the papers”.
