Dead Man Running: A True Story of a Secret Agent's Escape from the IRA and MI5 (16 page)

And my solicitor raised with Burton & Burton the question which had become of the greatest importance to me – my future security; ‘Our client remains concerned about the proposed arrangement for his security. The suggestion that it should be the responsibility of the senior officer at his local police station inspires no confidence at all. That was how his identity in this area was exposed . . . Our client requires to have contact with a named senior officer whom he can speak to if there are problems of a security nature. Our client has a perfectly valid reason for requiring his new identity and his new name should not be linked with Ashe or McGartland on the computer systems of the police because of matters outlined above. Northumbria Police should be able to confirm what occurred.’

To ram home to Burton & Burton once and for all what really occurred concerning my identity, my solicitor wrote; ‘Ashe’s address was disclosed in the criminal proceedings. He was committed from that particular address. It is the same address which appears on the driving licence which was a document produced in open court. There is no doubt that the prosecution process made Ashe’s address known and available . . . There is no doubt in Mr Ashe’s mind that he needs to relocate. It is quite clear that if anything does happen to Mr Ashe the authorities will bear a very heavy responsibility.’

I was continually pressed to accept all the proposals put forward by Burton & Burton’s mysterious clients, proposals which would have meant I was given a new name, a new driving licence and new National Insurance number but the fact that their financial offer was so paltry meant that I was condemned to stay in my flat in Blyth, a place well known to everyone living in the district. To me, my solicitors and my Special Branch friends in Belfast, the offer made by the mystery government agency seemed madness unless it was deliberately designed to force me to stay in my old home.

But no matter how hard the Crown agencies were pushed they steadfastly refused to give an inch. Three months after the trial, while I was still living rough moving from house to house, I was told that the Chief Constable of Northumbria was still satisfied with the current arrangements for my security, saying ‘the threat against Mr Ashe is not such that it requires him to move immediately’. But they continued to urge me to accept their offer of a new identity and an immediate move to a new home. On the other hand the Crown Agencies, which I was now satisfied were headed by MI5, refused to admit any liability for my situation and as a result claimed they had no legal obligation to assist in providing me with a new identity.

It seemed to me the various authorities were so confused that the right hand had no idea what the left hand was doing. And yet one month later, in September 1997, Home Secretary Jack Straw, the minister responsible for MI5, said in an interview; ‘I have an absolute duty to ensure agents’ lives are not put at risk.’

In October 1997 I received a further letter from the Home Secretary which once again showed extraordinary intransigence towards accepting the truth of the disclosure of my identity. It read, ‘I note all you say regarding the way in which your identity as Martin Ashe and your role as an agent came to be more widely known but I understand that it was you and not the prosecution who revealed your past during your court case. Indeed I understand that the prosecution, contrary to what you say in your letter, took considerable care to ensure that your precise address was not disclosed in court.’

I was amazed at the affront and the extent to which the Crown authorities would go to deny what they had done and accept their responsibility. We had proved by producing shorthand notes that Police Constable Weldon, PC 481 of Northumbria Police motor patrol, had revealed all in open court and still the Home Secretary refused to accept responsibility.

Taken aback by the Home Secretary’s refusal to accept responsibility for the disclosure my solicitor wrote another letter to Burton & Burton in which he told the Crown authorities, ‘It would appear that an attempt is being made to divert responsibility for the disclosure of our client’s identity in his trial to our client and his representatives. His name and address were disclosed in the Crown evidence. The Crown knew that his only conceivable defence involved the disclosure of his identity. The Crown was in a far better position than the defence to evaluate the impact of the prosecution as they had full insight as to Mr McGartland’s precise role and position in Northern Ireland, whereas the defence team simply had the bare instructions of their client whose importance and security problems were being belittled by the Crown. You well know that the case would not have been heard in camera unless that application had been supported by the Crown. You will appreciate that once our client’s identity was revealed he would become immediately traceable in any event by way of the social security computer which you will again know is not secure.

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Our client is resigned to the fact that there is no genuine wish to securely relocate him and without that there would be no security in a new identity. He is accordingly taking what steps he can to see to his own security in this area. He would see any threat to his safety as being very clearly at the door of the authorities.’

Determined to prove that there was a real threat to my life, my solicitor wrote to Ronnie Flanagan, the Chief Constable of the RUC, asking him to make an assessment of any threat posed to me from the IRA and associated bodies. During the following month the Police Division of Stormont House wrote to concerned members of the public who wanted action taken to provide me with proper security and a new identity. The letters made no comment suggesting to the recipients that the matter was of little importance.

But one month later no such assessment had been received by my solicitor and another letter was sent to the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland asking Mo Mowlam if she would exert some influence over the Crown authorities, and even consider personal intervention, because ‘we do not know with whom we are negotiating’.

Slowly but surely it appeared that the RUC had come to the conclusion that I was still under threat from the IRA and now they seemed prepared to admit it. In October 1997, Chief Superintendent G.W. Sillery of the RUC’s Command Secretariat replied on behalf of Chief Constable Ronnie Flanagan stating that there was a continuing threat against me from the IRA and offering me a new identity and finance to help me relocate. Superintendent Sillery went on to advise me to take up the offer of the new identity in a new location as soon as possible, to keep a low public profile and keep out of Northern Ireland. It seemed from the tone of the letter that the RUC were intent on persuading me to hurry in reaching a decision, and I wondered why.

Days earlier there had been an even greater surprise for me. It appeared I was nearing the truth about my abduction at the hands of the IRA. On Monday, 29 September 1997, I had been taken aback by what I heard on the BBC 1 television programme
Here & Now
from a former RUC intelligence officer being interviewed about the treatment I had received at the hands of the authorities. In fact, the RUC officer had been one of my handlers. He told the viewers, ‘I think Marty has been treated unfairly. He saved a lot of lives and did a lot of good. He seems to have been dumped. Agents like him are extremely valuable. And they should be looked after a lot better than Marty has been.’

Interviewer Wendy Robbins asked; ‘Why do you think the case of perverting the course of justice was brought against Marty McGartland in the first place?’

My handler, who was sitting in dark silhouette in the TV studio, replied, ‘I think there was a hidden agenda.’

Those words struck home hard. I had never spoken a word to the handler since I had left Northern Ireland in 1991. And he had no reason whatsoever to make such a suggestion. Now, here he was telling the entire nation on TV that there had been a hidden agenda in what had happened to me. I didn’t know whether he was referring to what had happened to me since my relocation to England in 1991 or to what had led to my kidnap, or both. But his statement on television convinced me that there had been some plot against me. I also believed at that moment that the campaign against me was not an accident of fate but something intentional and probably vindictive. But why? Now, more than ever, I was determined to discover the truth.

However, the Northumbria Police headquarters had been given details of the pre-recorded programme and had prepared a 400-word ‘News Item’ in advance which had been sent to the Belfast newspapers with a strict embargo. It read; ‘The Crown authorities reject any suggestion that Mr McGartland has been treated unreasonably. Individuals who have given valuable service to the country and who may be at threat as a result deserve – and receive – considerable support at public expense to ensure their safety. The techniques used to resettle and protect such individuals are obviously sensitive and cannot be discussed publicly. They have a proven track record but problems are bound to arise if the individual in question;

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Despite the difficulties which have arisen, the Crown authorities remain committed to providing the necessary and appropriate support to Mr McGartland. Northumbria Police, while not directly involved in the negotiations over Mr McGartland’s future, also support the approach which has and is being taken.

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While there continues to be a threat against Mr McGartland, it has not been such that he needs immediate police protection or to abandon immediately his current residence. He is encouraged to take up the offer, repeatedly made, of a new identity as soon as practicable in order to provide for his long-term security in the event that the threat should change.’

The statement continued, ‘We must emphasise that, no matter what services an individual may have performed in the public interest, he is not above the law and cannot be immune from prosecution if there is evidence to put before the courts. In such cases a decision to prosecute is taken by the Crown Prosecution service in the light of all the facts. In the Crown Court case involving Mr McGartland in May 1997, the CPS was able to bring the prosecution without reference to his past history and identity. Mr McGartland chose to reveal those details to the court in his defence and at no time requested that the case be heard in camera to protect them.’

It seemed extraordinary to me that the Northumbria Police, the force given the responsibility of protecting me from the IRA, should have sent their statement to the Belfast newspapers thus, at a stroke, providing the IRA with absolute proof in what part of England I was living.

Most of the statement had been taken up in criticising me for writing a book about my exploits as a Special Branch source and yet no one in Britain had known that Martin McGartland and Martin Ashe were one and the same person. I had taken the utmost precautions to ensure that no one knew that. And no one had known until a Northumbria Police officer had read out in open court my full home address. Even my next door neighbour of four years’ standing had told the media that she had no knowledge that my name was Martin McGartland until my trial at Newcastle Crown Court.

The force had also endeavoured to persuade the public that the decision to prosecute me had been taken by the CPS without reference to my past history and identity. That seemed extraordinary when the CPS had taken nearly two years to decide whether to bring the case to court and had admitted to my solicitor holding discussions with the Special Branch and other government agencies.

But what angered me most was the Northumbria Police force’s attempt to blame me for revealing my past as an RUC informant during my trial. That, of course, was my only possible defence and they knew it. They had gambled on me not revealing my personal history, making sure that they would secure an easy conviction, having brought a case, flawed in root and branch, against me. In ten minutes the jury had seen through the prosecution’s deceptions and found me not guilty. Due to the disgraceful decision to bring the charges against me the prosecution had all but forced me to reveal my true identity if I was to prove my innocence. The only question I could not answer and which the police shed no light on in their statement to the press was, ‘Why?’ Why did the Crown authorities, with all the knowledge they had about my background, decide to go ahead with such a flimsy case, thus ensuring my two identities and probably my home address would become public knowledge? I was more convinced than ever that it couldn’t have been an accident. That TV programme, and my handler’s candid assessment of my treatment by the authorities, had given me the proof for which I had been agitating. Now all I needed to know was, why?

I had become frustrated by the stalemate which now seemed to prevail over my problems with the authorities and I was determined to try and discover what really lay behind the Crown’s antipathy towards me and their scant concern for my security. I felt the time for me to take decisive action had arrived. I still believed that despite all the chicanery surrounding my case someone, or some organisation, authority or agency was determined to expose me to a possible IRA attack in exactly the same way as I had been deliberately led into an IRA trap in the August of 1991. Telling no one, I packed a change of clothes in a small bag, left my home early one autumn morning and made my way to Stranraer. I was returning to Belfast. Alone.