Two guilty of Lennon assault plot
Two men have been found guilty of plotting to assault Celtic boss Neil Lennon and other high profile supporters of the club.
Trevor Muirhead, 44, from Kilwinning in Scotland, and Neil McKenzie aged 42 and from Saltcoats, constructed packages marked for Lennon, the late QC Paul McBride and ex-MSP Trish Godman.
They had previously faced an allegation of conspiracy to murder before it was dropped earlier this week.
McKenzie was also found guilty of dispatching an item to Lennon at Celtic Park with the intention of inducing him to believe it would “explode or ignite”. However, the jury returned a not proven verdict on that allegation against Muirhead.
The case against them centred on five suspicious packages – two of which were addressed to Lennon – discovered last year.
Police initially said the packages had been designed to kill or maim their intended targets, which also included the Republican organisation Cairde Na hÉireann.
However, Muirhead and McKenzie had constructed devices that could not explode, with the latter getting “bomb making” tips from 1980s US television show The A-Team.
The duo committed a string of gaffes that lead to their conviction. McKenzie chatted about “building a bomb”, unaware his car had been bugged by detectives.
The unemployed builder was also caught on CCTV buying parts for the packages while out at his local shops with his pensioner mother.
His accomplice Muirhead told his daughter-in-law to ignore “a bang in the night” in her street where one of the parcels was intercepted hours later. The father-of-six got his hairdresser son to buy bottles of peroxide later used to make a substance found in the “bombs”.
The pair also once discussed “our package” by text message.
A search of Muirhead’s house in Kilwinning in May 2011 uncovered petrol cans, a quantity of black wire and a bottle of cream peroxide. Other items found were an “oath of allegiance” to the Scottish Unionist Association, a Union flag and two flags featuring the Red Hand of Ulster.
Muirhead said he had obtained peroxide and passed it on to McKenzie, claiming that he was “terrified” of him.
“I know he’s got pure hatred and it seems to be aimed at Neil Lennon and anything to do with with Celtic Football Club,” Muirhead had told police officers.
McKenzie admitted knowing about the first device sent to Lennon and confessed to buying parts for other packages adding: “I told folk how to make them.”
Prosecutor Tim Niven Smith said in his closing speech that the Crown case was based on the belief both accused thought the packages were harmful.
However, Muirhead’s QC Gordon Jackson said you would have to be “dafter” than the accused to think they would go off. Donald Findlay QC, defending McKenzie, told the jury “no one with two brain cells” would believe the parcels would explode.
Sentencing has been deferred until April 27.
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