>interviewed over three days without a lawyer until admissions were made.
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> “I was punched constantly with a closed fist in the head and slapped and beaten about,” she alleged.
>
>Further claims were made that she had been hit hard in the stomach, thrown against a wall, and told that officers could rape her without anyone knowing
A woman who claimed she was beaten as a teenage girl into making admissions about terrorist bombings 45 years ago has lost a legal battle to have her convictions overturned.
Patricia Wilson alleged that police officers investigating attacks on two shops in Belfast constantly punched, slapped and threatened her during interrogation. But in a majority verdict, judges at the Court of Appeal refused her appeal after rejecting the account of ill-treatment.
Sir Declan Morgan said: “I am satisfied beyond reasonable doubt that she did not sustain the physical attacks that she alleged in various contradictory ways.” In 1978 Ms Wilson, 63, was convicted at a non-jury trial on two counts of causing an explosion likely to endanger life or property, and two counts of possessing an explosive substance.
She was also found guilty of carrying a firearm with intent and membership of Irish republican woman’s paramilitary organisation Cumann na mBan. A ten-year prison sentence was imposed for the offences connected to two separate bombings the previous year.
The prosecution contended that Ms Wilson had been involved in explosions which destroyed a wallpaper and paint shop on the Crumlin Road in January 1977 and a confectionery store at Castle Lane in the city centre two months later. She was arrested as a 17-year-old, taken to the RUC’s Castlereagh Holding Centre and interviewed over three days without a lawyer until admissions were made.
Although complaints of being physically assaulted and verbally abused were made to a doctor, no allegations of ill-treatment were raised at her trial. In 2014 Ms Wilson applied to the Criminal Cases Review Commission to examine her convictions, but ultimately the body decided against referring her case to the Court of Appeal.
Defence lawyers sought an extension of time to mount a further challenge, based on previously undisclosed evidence about the complaints said to back the case that her confession statement should not have been allowed.
In her account Ms Wilson claimed two officers at Castlereagh tried to break her arms and said she would need a hospital when they had finished with her. “I was punched constantly with a closed fist in the head and slapped and beaten about,” she alleged.
Further claims were made that she had been hit hard in the stomach, thrown against a wall, and told that officers could rape her without anyone knowing. “I was subjected to constant mental and physical abuse culminating in my final interview in which I signed the prepared statements,” Ms Wilson said.
The three-judge panel was unable to reach a unanimous conclusion in the case. Setting out reasons why he would have allowed the appeal, Lord Justice Treacy held that by today’s standards the teenage suspect had been denied measures now thought necessary to avoid a miscarriage of justice.
“It is to my mind inconceivable that the confession of this juvenile, forming the sole basis of her prosecution and conviction, obtained in Castlereagh without any of even the most basic of these safeguards, could be regarded as safe,” he said. But Sir Declan, backed by judicial colleague Sir Paul Maguire, described her evidence as “deeply contradictory and unreliable”.
“She now seeks to pursue a challenge to her admissions but has provided no reasonable explanation for her failure to do so at her trial,” he pointed out. Refusing Ms Wilson leave to extend time for an appeal against conviction by a two to one majority, Sir Declan added: “I do not consider that there was any unfairness in this case by reason of any failure of disclosure.”
I mean she’s in there for three days without a lawyer suspected of terrorist offences in the 70s. On the balance of probabilities you’d have to think she was slapped about. What was contradictory about her evidence?
3 comments
>interviewed over three days without a lawyer until admissions were made.
​
> “I was punched constantly with a closed fist in the head and slapped and beaten about,” she alleged.
>
>Further claims were made that she had been hit hard in the stomach, thrown against a wall, and told that officers could rape her without anyone knowing
A woman who claimed she was beaten as a teenage girl into making admissions about terrorist bombings 45 years ago has lost a legal battle to have her convictions overturned.
Patricia Wilson alleged that police officers investigating attacks on two shops in Belfast constantly punched, slapped and threatened her during interrogation. But in a majority verdict, judges at the Court of Appeal refused her appeal after rejecting the account of ill-treatment.
Sir Declan Morgan said: “I am satisfied beyond reasonable doubt that she did not sustain the physical attacks that she alleged in various contradictory ways.” In 1978 Ms Wilson, 63, was convicted at a non-jury trial on two counts of causing an explosion likely to endanger life or property, and two counts of possessing an explosive substance.
She was also found guilty of carrying a firearm with intent and membership of Irish republican woman’s paramilitary organisation Cumann na mBan. A ten-year prison sentence was imposed for the offences connected to two separate bombings the previous year.
The prosecution contended that Ms Wilson had been involved in explosions which destroyed a wallpaper and paint shop on the Crumlin Road in January 1977 and a confectionery store at Castle Lane in the city centre two months later. She was arrested as a 17-year-old, taken to the RUC’s Castlereagh Holding Centre and interviewed over three days without a lawyer until admissions were made.
Although complaints of being physically assaulted and verbally abused were made to a doctor, no allegations of ill-treatment were raised at her trial. In 2014 Ms Wilson applied to the Criminal Cases Review Commission to examine her convictions, but ultimately the body decided against referring her case to the Court of Appeal.
Defence lawyers sought an extension of time to mount a further challenge, based on previously undisclosed evidence about the complaints said to back the case that her confession statement should not have been allowed.
In her account Ms Wilson claimed two officers at Castlereagh tried to break her arms and said she would need a hospital when they had finished with her. “I was punched constantly with a closed fist in the head and slapped and beaten about,” she alleged.
Further claims were made that she had been hit hard in the stomach, thrown against a wall, and told that officers could rape her without anyone knowing. “I was subjected to constant mental and physical abuse culminating in my final interview in which I signed the prepared statements,” Ms Wilson said.
The three-judge panel was unable to reach a unanimous conclusion in the case. Setting out reasons why he would have allowed the appeal, Lord Justice Treacy held that by today’s standards the teenage suspect had been denied measures now thought necessary to avoid a miscarriage of justice.
“It is to my mind inconceivable that the confession of this juvenile, forming the sole basis of her prosecution and conviction, obtained in Castlereagh without any of even the most basic of these safeguards, could be regarded as safe,” he said. But Sir Declan, backed by judicial colleague Sir Paul Maguire, described her evidence as “deeply contradictory and unreliable”.
“She now seeks to pursue a challenge to her admissions but has provided no reasonable explanation for her failure to do so at her trial,” he pointed out. Refusing Ms Wilson leave to extend time for an appeal against conviction by a two to one majority, Sir Declan added: “I do not consider that there was any unfairness in this case by reason of any failure of disclosure.”
I mean she’s in there for three days without a lawyer suspected of terrorist offences in the 70s. On the balance of probabilities you’d have to think she was slapped about. What was contradictory about her evidence?