Barrister tells of inquiry emotion

Michael Mansfield QC has revealed his emotion over Bloody Sunday Inquiry
12 April 2012

One of the UK's most celebrated barristers, Michael Mansfield QC, has revealed the culmination of the Bloody Sunday Inquiry was the most emotional day of his career.

The leading human rights lawyer, who has been involved in some of the most famous cases in recent legal history, represented a number of families during the long-running inquiry.

Thirteen marchers were shot dead on January 30 1972 in Londonderry when British paratroopers opened fire on crowds at a civil rights demonstration.

Fourteen others were wounded, one of whom later died.

The Saville Report was heavily critical of the Army and found that soldiers fired the first shot.

Asked if the 12-year inquiry was worth it, Mr Mansfield told BBC Radio 4's Desert Island Discs: "If you ask any of the families, they felt, quite rightly, that the truth about what happened in 1972 when people died on the streets of Derry, shot by British military forces, had never been uncovered. It took a long time, it certainly did, but it was worth every penny because it wasn't dealing with an isolated incident.

"He had in fact, Lord Saville, a remit much broader than that, it was part of the peace process at that time looking back at what had happened in the 20 years before that, which had led to this situation where British troops were effectively occupying the streets in this way and led to the shooting.

"Now that's an enormous task, if you were a mother, or a father or a relative and you had had your relatives murdered, you would want that to be recognised."

The 69-year-old, who has been a lawyer for more than 40 years, said the end of the inquiry in which criticism was levelled at the Army was highly emotional for him.

He explained: "This was a moment that they had waited for and there was emotion welling up in all of them and for me probably, it was the most moving day of 42 years."

Create a FREE account to continue reading

eros

Registration is a free and easy way to support our journalism.

Join our community where you can: comment on stories; sign up to newsletters; enter competitions and access content on our app.

Your email address

Must be at least 6 characters, include an upper and lower case character and a number

You must be at least 18 years old to create an account

* Required fields

Already have an account? SIGN IN

By clicking Create Account you confirm that your data has been entered correctly and you have read and agree to our Terms of use , Cookie policy and Privacy policy .

This site is protected by reCAPTCHA and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply.

Thank you for registering

Please refresh the page or navigate to another page on the site to be automatically logged in