0:00:02 > 0:00:08This programme contains strong language and scenes which some viewers may find upsetting
0:00:11 > 0:00:14This was my patch as a wee boy.
0:00:14 > 0:00:17The Shankill.
0:00:20 > 0:00:23I won't be the only person from round here
0:00:23 > 0:00:26who resents the name of the Shankill being welded
0:00:26 > 0:00:29to the worst gang of serial killers in British history...
0:00:32 > 0:00:35..a gang that gruesomely lived up to their name.
0:00:38 > 0:00:40The Shankill Butchers.
0:00:42 > 0:00:44It shamed the Shankill community.
0:00:44 > 0:00:46It shamed it.
0:00:46 > 0:00:50He was part... practically decapitated.
0:00:51 > 0:00:53I saw the body
0:00:53 > 0:00:57lying several yards up on the waste ground.
0:00:57 > 0:00:59Walked towards it.
0:00:59 > 0:01:02I knew it was another one.
0:01:02 > 0:01:05Had these victims been Protestants,
0:01:05 > 0:01:09this would never have been allowed to go on for as long as it did.
0:01:09 > 0:01:14They shouldn't have been called the Shankill Butchers. They were murdering thugs.
0:01:15 > 0:01:19That fact runs through thousands of pages of evidence.
0:01:19 > 0:01:2440 years on, we've been given unique access to that evidence
0:01:24 > 0:01:30and the man who caught the Shankill Butchers speaks publicly for the first time.
0:01:30 > 0:01:36We didn't go after loyalist paramilitaries or republican paramilitaries.
0:01:36 > 0:01:39We went after killers.
0:01:39 > 0:01:43There's one question that cries out from the evidence
0:01:43 > 0:01:47as it does from the victims' families who've never spoken out before.
0:01:49 > 0:01:54How did the Shankill Butchers get away with it for so long?
0:02:06 > 0:02:08Hello, how are you doing?
0:02:08 > 0:02:11- Great.- Good. You're doing all right.
0:02:11 > 0:02:17I was just six when the Shankill Butchers were convicted in 1979.
0:02:17 > 0:02:24The savage murders they carried out were the talk of the road at a time of everyday brutality.
0:02:29 > 0:02:341972 saw the highest death toll of the Troubles in one year.
0:02:34 > 0:02:39Nearly 500 people were killed.
0:02:39 > 0:02:42In January, Bloody Sunday was seared into the memory.
0:02:47 > 0:02:49Horror followed upon horror.
0:02:51 > 0:02:55Loyalists and republican paramilitaries killed at will.
0:03:05 > 0:03:12In July, 20 IRA bombs exploded in central Belfast in what became known as Bloody Friday.
0:03:12 > 0:03:18Nine were killed, 130 injured.
0:03:18 > 0:03:22Events like Bloody Friday was a big watershed.
0:03:22 > 0:03:26After that, the Troubles began to get more and more vicious.
0:03:26 > 0:03:28A lot of men joined the organisations
0:03:28 > 0:03:32thinking this was the only way they could defend their own community.
0:03:32 > 0:03:34I had friends who joined at that stage
0:03:34 > 0:03:35with that sole intention
0:03:35 > 0:03:39that if the IRA was going to blow up bus stations, we'd better get ready for a war.
0:03:39 > 0:03:43HE BARKS ORDERS
0:03:43 > 0:03:47The paramilitary underworld became a breeding ground for violence.
0:03:47 > 0:03:51Power struggles between the UDA and UVF were rampant.
0:03:51 > 0:03:55I think from then on, there was a fear come into the Protestant community
0:03:55 > 0:04:01that perhaps we had unleashed something we would find very, very difficult to curtail.
0:04:06 > 0:04:09Two months after the Belfast bombings, a 32-year-old Protestant
0:04:09 > 0:04:15called William Edward Pavis was murdered in one such feud.
0:04:15 > 0:04:22The killer who shot him in the head in broad daylight was almost certainly this man,
0:04:22 > 0:04:23Lenny Murphy.
0:04:28 > 0:04:31How Murphy got away with it tells us a lot about the man
0:04:31 > 0:04:35who went on to mastermind the killings of the Shankill Butchers.
0:04:39 > 0:04:43Murphy was charged alongside his getaway driver, Mervyn Connor.
0:04:43 > 0:04:45He named Murphy as the killer.
0:04:47 > 0:04:52Amazingly, they were put on the same wing in Crumlin Road Gaol.
0:04:52 > 0:05:00But just two months before the trial, Murphy's major accuser was dead, killed by cyanide.
0:05:04 > 0:05:08Beside him, an apparent suicide note.
0:05:08 > 0:05:14This is a copy of the note. It's never been made public before.
0:05:14 > 0:05:16"To whom it may concern. During my time in prison,
0:05:16 > 0:05:21"I've done nothing but think what I've done to the fellow called..." and the name's redacted.
0:05:21 > 0:05:25'We know Mervyn Connor is writing about Murphy.
0:05:25 > 0:05:28'Here, on the day he was poisoned,
0:05:28 > 0:05:33'he says naming Murphy as the killer was a lie he couldn't live with.
0:05:33 > 0:05:35'The police conclusion?
0:05:35 > 0:05:39'Murphy'd made sure he didn't have to.'
0:05:39 > 0:05:41It was common knowledge
0:05:41 > 0:05:47that Murphy had been responsible for Connor's death.
0:05:47 > 0:05:49Common knowledge?
0:05:49 > 0:05:51A very, very extremely cunning man.
0:05:51 > 0:05:55Could adjust to any circumstances in which he found himself.
0:05:55 > 0:05:58Murphy probably threatened to kill him if he didn't do it.
0:05:58 > 0:06:03He was totally ruthless and sadistic
0:06:03 > 0:06:08and if he had been involved in the murders that he was suspected of,
0:06:08 > 0:06:15of Pavis and Connors, he'd be capable of almost anything.
0:06:17 > 0:06:23In June 1973, Murphy was acquitted of the Pavis murder.
0:06:27 > 0:06:32For the next two years, Murphy built on his reputation for utter ruthlessness.
0:06:36 > 0:06:41He was just 23, but already he was thought to have murdered as many as ten people.
0:06:44 > 0:06:46He also set up his own unit.
0:06:46 > 0:06:51It's unofficial headquarters was here - Lawnbrook Avenue, right in the heart of the Shankill.
0:06:51 > 0:06:54Murphy recruited three henchmen.
0:06:54 > 0:07:01They all had one thing in common - a deep-seated hatred of Catholics.
0:07:03 > 0:07:0725-year-old Robert "Basher" Bates was a petty criminal
0:07:07 > 0:07:12and had been in and out of borstal throughout his childhood.
0:07:12 > 0:07:1720-year-old Sam McAllister was another young offender with a reputation for violence.
0:07:19 > 0:07:24The third of Murphy's henchmen was 25-year-old William Moore.
0:07:24 > 0:07:26He drove a black taxi.
0:07:26 > 0:07:32He had also worked as a meat packer and had access to a set of butcher's knives.
0:07:32 > 0:07:35About 12 others passed through the gang,
0:07:35 > 0:07:39but these three members, Moore, McAllister and Bates,
0:07:39 > 0:07:42they were Lenny Murphy's hard core.
0:07:45 > 0:07:48He controlled them absolutely.
0:07:50 > 0:07:53No-one in the circle talked.
0:07:53 > 0:07:59The fear that he instilled in them made sure they didn't talk.
0:07:59 > 0:08:02No-one knew about their activities.
0:08:02 > 0:08:05No-one was allowed in the Lawnbrook Club
0:08:05 > 0:08:08when they were discussing tactics.
0:08:08 > 0:08:11It was a completely closed shop.
0:08:14 > 0:08:18But being a player in the mainstream loyalist underworld wasn't enough for Murphy.
0:08:18 > 0:08:24He was determined to unleash a level of sectarian savagery never before seen in Northern Ireland.
0:08:26 > 0:08:29Murphy was about to up the ante...
0:08:29 > 0:08:30big time.
0:08:46 > 0:08:52On 25th November 1975, the body of Frank Crossan,
0:08:52 > 0:08:58a north Belfast Catholic, was discovered by a Shankill resident.
0:08:58 > 0:09:01It was about 100 yards down that street in an entry.
0:09:05 > 0:09:11I saw this horrendous wound in the throat of the man. The blood was still oozing.
0:09:11 > 0:09:14It was absolutely grotesque.
0:09:14 > 0:09:19Frank Crossan had been practically decapitated.
0:09:19 > 0:09:25He was attacked, hit over the head with a wheel brace and pulled into a waiting car.
0:09:25 > 0:09:31He was driven to an alleyway on the Shankill Road and his throat was cut.
0:09:33 > 0:09:39It was different. It was... it was so savage, so barbaric.
0:09:39 > 0:09:45We'd come across people being stabbed, attacks with knives...
0:09:45 > 0:09:48This man obviously had been overpowered
0:09:48 > 0:09:51and his throat deliberately slit open.
0:09:51 > 0:09:55Evil is the only way you could describe it.
0:09:55 > 0:09:56Just evil.
0:09:58 > 0:10:04Frank Crossan's body was dumped almost within sight of Tennent Street police station,
0:10:04 > 0:10:07where Jimmy Nesbitt was head of CID.
0:10:11 > 0:10:15This is a report on Francis Joseph Crossan
0:10:15 > 0:10:19which was done by me in November 1975.
0:10:19 > 0:10:24He had cutthroat wounds, a number of cutthroat wounds,
0:10:24 > 0:10:26some of them quite superficial
0:10:26 > 0:10:31but some quite deep, going back to the spine.
0:10:39 > 0:10:42Frank Crossan was abducted from an area known as Millfield,
0:10:42 > 0:10:46at the back of what is now CastleCourt shopping centre.
0:10:46 > 0:10:49A series of side streets and alleyways,
0:10:49 > 0:10:53Millfield gives a short cut in and out of the city centre.
0:10:54 > 0:10:58We went through every possible line of inquiry.
0:11:03 > 0:11:09Those streets along that area were dark and deserted.
0:11:09 > 0:11:11Nobody saw anything?
0:11:11 > 0:11:13There was no-one about.
0:11:13 > 0:11:16There was no-one about and that's why he was abducted.
0:11:18 > 0:11:22When police carried out door-to-door enquiries on the Shankill
0:11:22 > 0:11:25they say they were met with a wall of silence.
0:11:27 > 0:11:32It's all right for outsiders to say, "Why don't you speak up? Why don't you do this?"
0:11:32 > 0:11:35You don't know if your neighbour was involved.
0:11:35 > 0:11:37You don't know what might happen to your kids.
0:11:37 > 0:11:40You've got to live in the area to know and taste that fear.
0:11:40 > 0:11:44So, if people had have spoken out, what would have happened?
0:11:44 > 0:11:47They probably would have found themselves the victims.
0:11:47 > 0:11:51It was very few people would have put their head above the parapet in those days
0:11:51 > 0:11:53because you were likely to have it cut off.
0:11:53 > 0:11:57People decided, there's one other alternative - go in and close the door.
0:11:57 > 0:12:01These things aren't happening in our name but we don't have to be a part of it.
0:12:01 > 0:12:03- Close the door and let the murders continue?- Yes.
0:12:03 > 0:12:10If you're going up a blind alley and you're going to where a victim was kidnapped and there are no witnesses,
0:12:10 > 0:12:15there's no evidence, there's no clues, there's nothing to go on...
0:12:15 > 0:12:19it doesn't matter how many people you have, you can only go to a certain distance.
0:12:24 > 0:12:28Less than two months after Frank Crossan's murder,
0:12:28 > 0:12:33Ted McQuaid and his wife were walking home from a party in the north of the city.
0:12:33 > 0:12:39When they reached the bottom of the Cliftonville Road, the door of a vehicle swung open.
0:12:39 > 0:12:42A man jumped out and shot Ted McQuaid in the head.
0:12:42 > 0:12:48His wife could only watch as the murderers sped off into the night.
0:12:48 > 0:12:54But critically, she was able to tell the police the killers escaped in a black taxi.
0:12:56 > 0:12:58The police couldn't trace the taxi
0:12:58 > 0:13:03and Ted McQuaid's murder was treated as just another sectarian killing.
0:13:05 > 0:13:08But there were similarities with Frank Crossan's murder.
0:13:10 > 0:13:14Two Catholics on their way home after a night out...
0:13:15 > 0:13:19..both within the same one-mile radius of Millfield...
0:13:21 > 0:13:25..and a now black taxi ferrying the gang.
0:13:26 > 0:13:28A pattern was emerging.
0:13:32 > 0:13:37North Belfast was a patchwork of Catholic and Protestant ghettoes,
0:13:37 > 0:13:43some just one or two streets, creating dozens of interfaces and flashpoints.
0:13:43 > 0:13:50During the Troubles, more murders were investigated here than anywhere else in Northern Ireland.
0:13:50 > 0:13:55The patch covered right from North Street, right up the Shankill Road,
0:13:55 > 0:13:57up the Ballygomartin Road,
0:13:57 > 0:14:02up the Crumlin Road, right up to Ligoniel.
0:14:02 > 0:14:06It was an area of approximately 15 square miles,
0:14:06 > 0:14:08about 150,000 people.
0:14:16 > 0:14:21Brendan Brown's family ran a Catholic social club in Millfield.
0:14:21 > 0:14:27During the '70s, anyone walking through the warren of side streets and alleyways near his bar
0:14:27 > 0:14:33was usually heading towards a Catholic area of north Belfast.
0:14:33 > 0:14:36Protestants just wouldn't have walked round this district.
0:14:36 > 0:14:40If you're wanting to kill a Catholic, it was very easy to identify one?
0:14:40 > 0:14:43Yes, anybody walking round here was a taig.
0:14:43 > 0:14:46Or was seen as a taig. That's just the way it was.
0:14:50 > 0:14:54Thomas Quinn was the next Catholic to be abducted from Millfield.
0:14:54 > 0:14:59He'd been drinking in Brendan Brown's club the night he died.
0:14:59 > 0:15:02So, on that night, what were your last memories of Thomas Quinn?
0:15:02 > 0:15:05Just of Tommy leaving the club to go up home
0:15:05 > 0:15:07and shouting good night to him.
0:15:07 > 0:15:11I actually shouted, "Good night, Titch, see you tomorrow, " and that was it.
0:15:11 > 0:15:14Your brother was working for O'Kanes undertakers...
0:15:14 > 0:15:17- Yes.- ..round the corner, and picked Thomas Quinn's body up.
0:15:17 > 0:15:21They had the contract with the coroner to pick anybody up who had died suddenly,
0:15:21 > 0:15:24and whenever he came back, we asked him, was it anybody we knew.
0:15:24 > 0:15:27He says, "I've never seen the man before in my life."
0:15:27 > 0:15:29- How did he not recognise him? - Well...
0:15:29 > 0:15:30The man was mangled.
0:15:33 > 0:15:36- REPORTER:- A 55-year-old road sweeper was found at this spot.
0:15:36 > 0:15:39much the worse for drink one evening, he was grabbed by the gang,
0:15:39 > 0:15:42bundled into a car and driven here to his death.
0:15:44 > 0:15:48I remember the body lying again,
0:15:48 > 0:15:52this pitiful-looking man with his throat cut.
0:15:52 > 0:15:54- Cut in the same way?- Yes.
0:15:54 > 0:15:59In the Thomas Quinn murder, along the route, there had been a noise heard
0:15:59 > 0:16:04of a heavy-sounding engine like a black taxi,
0:16:04 > 0:16:08so then we began looking at who had black taxis
0:16:08 > 0:16:12and that sort of thing, you know - a wide, wide-scale inquiry.
0:16:12 > 0:16:16But there were... I think 700 or 800 black taxis
0:16:16 > 0:16:18operating in the area at that time.
0:16:18 > 0:16:23During the investigation, the police say William Moore's taxi
0:16:23 > 0:16:29was forensically tested at least once, but they found nothing.
0:16:29 > 0:16:32- Do you think at that stage you're looking for one man?- No.
0:16:32 > 0:16:36Because obviously both men had been overpowered
0:16:36 > 0:16:41and taken to their place of execution, and one man couldn't have done that.
0:16:41 > 0:16:47And you're trying to find out in your own head, OK, who within my patch hates Catholics that much?
0:16:47 > 0:16:52A lot of people, unfortunately, at that stage.
0:16:52 > 0:16:57An awful lot of names who could kill someone in such a brutal way?
0:16:57 > 0:17:02There were hundreds of paramilitaries who resided in the area.
0:17:02 > 0:17:05And was Murphy, or anyone like him, remotely on the radar?
0:17:05 > 0:17:10- He would have been on the radar, yeah.- Why?
0:17:10 > 0:17:15Simply because, you know, he was sort of a cunning boy.
0:17:15 > 0:17:19We knew he was in the UVF, but he very much kept a low profile.
0:17:24 > 0:17:26There'll be no stress down here, Jim.
0:17:26 > 0:17:29No, a very quiet life most of the time.
0:17:29 > 0:17:31'Investigative journalist Jim Campbell
0:17:31 > 0:17:34'says he spoke to loyalist leaders on the Shankill
0:17:34 > 0:17:38'who said they knew precisely who was running the gang.'
0:17:39 > 0:17:47I'd started writing about the Butcher gang back in the early '70s,
0:17:47 > 0:17:50even before a lot of people realised
0:17:50 > 0:17:55that there were serial killers on the loose.
0:17:55 > 0:17:57I was picking up reports
0:17:57 > 0:18:03about this man who they called a "bloody psychopath".
0:18:03 > 0:18:08They, like many members of the local community, were frightened of him.
0:18:08 > 0:18:14Not perhaps of what he would do himself, but what he was capable of ordering others to do.
0:18:14 > 0:18:17- This was Murphy? - Murphy, Lenny Murphy.
0:18:17 > 0:18:19We couldn't publish Murphy's name at the time
0:18:19 > 0:18:23because we had no proof, just as the police at that time had no proof.
0:18:23 > 0:18:29But being named within journalistic circles, within loyalism?
0:18:29 > 0:18:31- And within the police. - And within the police?
0:18:31 > 0:18:36Yeah, the police would have known that Lenny Murphy was the leader of the gang.
0:18:36 > 0:18:39- That's not what they tell me, Jim. - Well...
0:18:39 > 0:18:45It's amazing, because most people on the Shankill Road knew Lenny Murphy,
0:18:45 > 0:18:49knew what he was up to and lived in total fear of him.
0:18:55 > 0:19:00Lenny Murphy was not amenable to the hierarchy in the UVF.
0:19:00 > 0:19:06He kept involved in certain activities, with their approval,
0:19:06 > 0:19:09and what they authorised him to do,
0:19:09 > 0:19:14but when they moved into this cutthroat killings,
0:19:14 > 0:19:18they became almost a renegade, breakaway group.
0:19:18 > 0:19:23And I'm satisfied that the UVF hierarchy
0:19:23 > 0:19:27did not know who was carrying out these murders.
0:19:27 > 0:19:33- Did not know?- Did not know, and certainly would not have given their approval.
0:19:33 > 0:19:35That's a big statement to make...
0:19:35 > 0:19:36Yeah.
0:19:36 > 0:19:42- ..for a man that bases everything on evidence.- Yeah.
0:19:42 > 0:19:44It's inconceivable, with respect, Jimmy.
0:19:44 > 0:19:47It's inconceivable that in such a tight-knit community,
0:19:47 > 0:19:51where everybody knows where everybody's moving,
0:19:51 > 0:19:55the police didn't know and now the UVF doesn't know either.
0:19:55 > 0:20:00- Inconceivable. - A very tightly-knit circle.
0:20:00 > 0:20:06No-one in the circle talked. They were too frightened to talk.
0:20:07 > 0:20:11I would imagine there'd have been at least 30 or 40% of the community
0:20:11 > 0:20:14who would have known who the Butchers were,
0:20:14 > 0:20:16but they weren't going to name them.
0:20:16 > 0:20:23These people had such a grip on the community and there was such fear, you didn't cross them.
0:20:23 > 0:20:29I very often asked myself, did the leaders of the UDA and the UVF know what was going on?
0:20:29 > 0:20:32Was this being done in their name? Were they allowing this to happen?
0:20:32 > 0:20:35Because at that time, I was of the impression
0:20:35 > 0:20:38nothing would happen in the area that they didn't sanction,
0:20:38 > 0:20:41in the same way you'd say about the Provisional IRA.
0:20:41 > 0:20:43You just have your own thoughts about it.
0:20:46 > 0:20:51'Just over a fortnight after Thomas Quinn was murdered, a fourth butchered victim.
0:20:51 > 0:20:54'Francis Rice was picked up in Millfield.
0:20:54 > 0:20:56'His throat was cut.
0:20:56 > 0:21:00'His body was dumped in an entry off the Shankill Road.'
0:21:00 > 0:21:05Did you have any people that you were watching more closely?
0:21:05 > 0:21:08No, we were no further forward.
0:21:08 > 0:21:09So the Butchers were winning?
0:21:09 > 0:21:11They were winning.
0:21:11 > 0:21:19They were getting the headlines, and the fear that they instilled,
0:21:19 > 0:21:20it affected the whole city.
0:21:20 > 0:21:24- MAN:- It has got to be stopped, one way or another.
0:21:24 > 0:21:28If this goes on and if the Government allows this to go on,
0:21:28 > 0:21:31basic humanity is going to break down.
0:21:31 > 0:21:34Our whole civilisation is at stake here.
0:21:34 > 0:21:38You've used fairly extreme language in describing these killers.
0:21:38 > 0:21:41You've described them as Jack the Ripper types.
0:21:41 > 0:21:46Jack the Ripper is a gruesome character in history.
0:21:46 > 0:21:48To me, this is gruesome.
0:21:48 > 0:21:50This is inhuman.
0:21:50 > 0:21:53Bestial. It's...
0:21:53 > 0:21:56The fact that people were getting picked up randomly
0:21:56 > 0:21:58and usually, as far as I know,
0:21:58 > 0:22:00they were all innocent people, so it wasn't as if,
0:22:00 > 0:22:02I'm not involved in that, so I'm safe.
0:22:02 > 0:22:07You didn't have to be anybody, you could be anybody going about your business,
0:22:07 > 0:22:09That was what was so fearsome about it.
0:22:09 > 0:22:12The killers were dubbed the Shankill Butchers.
0:22:12 > 0:22:14It shamed the Shankill community.
0:22:14 > 0:22:16It shamed it.
0:22:16 > 0:22:18What's wrong with that label?
0:22:18 > 0:22:22In my opinion, they shouldn't have been called the Shankill Butchers.
0:22:22 > 0:22:24They were murdering thugs.
0:22:24 > 0:22:27Shankill was put onto them deliberately to raise the profile
0:22:27 > 0:22:30that this is happening in the Protestant community,
0:22:30 > 0:22:32but that's the media's fault.
0:22:34 > 0:22:40It was now three months since their first victim, and with no sign of the Shankill Butchers being caught,
0:22:40 > 0:22:45reports of their sadism spread like wildfire.
0:22:45 > 0:22:50There have been some very well-known teams of serial killers that have operated.
0:22:50 > 0:22:55In the UK, in particular, for example, Ian Brady and Myra Hindley, Fred and Rosemary West.
0:22:55 > 0:22:59What are your thoughts on the type of people that they were,
0:22:59 > 0:23:01the type of person Lenny Murphy was?
0:23:01 > 0:23:04It seems that there is a very specific hatred he had for Catholics
0:23:04 > 0:23:08and he was going to do anything he could
0:23:08 > 0:23:13to stop Catholics encroaching on his territory, community, whatever.
0:23:13 > 0:23:15So, it is an aberrant behaviour.
0:23:15 > 0:23:18The difficulty is trying to explain it.
0:23:18 > 0:23:21The psychopathy or the psychopath is one explanation for it.
0:23:21 > 0:23:23- There may well be others as well. - Like what?
0:23:23 > 0:23:29It may be that they could almost form themselves into an army, so they think they're defending territory,
0:23:29 > 0:23:34not a legitimate army as, say, the British Army or other armies around the world,
0:23:34 > 0:23:38but they have that type of mentality, that they're defending a particular area.
0:23:38 > 0:23:44There was so much press about the Shankill Butchers. Do you think that empowered this gang,
0:23:44 > 0:23:47drove them to kill even more?
0:23:47 > 0:23:51The power aspect that individuals would have got from this would have been very high,
0:23:51 > 0:23:54given the reporting levels that appeared to be at the time,
0:23:54 > 0:23:59and also the amount of terror which appears to have been placed into the community by their actions
0:23:59 > 0:24:02again would have given them the feelings of power.
0:24:07 > 0:24:15With no sign of police catching the gang, on both sides of the community, fear intensified.
0:24:15 > 0:24:18People in north Belfast now dreaded having to go out.
0:24:21 > 0:24:22We never went anywhere.
0:24:22 > 0:24:27After it got dark, you never, ever went anywhere on your own.
0:24:27 > 0:24:32It really was the most fearful time I've ever had in my life.
0:24:32 > 0:24:40When people did venture out, their greatest fear was of being approached by a black taxi.
0:24:40 > 0:24:41There was one night we came out,
0:24:41 > 0:24:43my brother got into the car and I went to lock the club up
0:24:43 > 0:24:45and my brother shouted to me,
0:24:45 > 0:24:47"Quick, Brendan, get into the effing car,"
0:24:47 > 0:24:51and I jumped into the car, and as we were driving down the street,
0:24:51 > 0:24:55down at the far end, down here, they had a young lad against the wall.
0:24:55 > 0:24:58The black taxi was sitting... you could see half of the taxi.
0:24:58 > 0:25:01The front half of it was up past the houses in Stephen Street.
0:25:01 > 0:25:04One of them was shouting, "Take him over Shankill and get the knives,"
0:25:04 > 0:25:07and the other one was shouting, "Shoot the Fenian bastard."
0:25:07 > 0:25:13Whenever he heard the door banging and the car lights turning, he said he realised then
0:25:13 > 0:25:15he was on his own and that's when he made us break the run.
0:25:15 > 0:25:21Ask anybody from this district and they'll tell you they could've picked the Butchers up at any stage.
0:25:21 > 0:25:23- How come?- They knew who they were.
0:25:23 > 0:25:26They could have picked them up at any stage.
0:25:26 > 0:25:30People round here's of the opinion the Butchers were allowed a free hand
0:25:30 > 0:25:34and nobody will convince them any different.
0:25:34 > 0:25:36Although taxis were heard,
0:25:36 > 0:25:41there was no number plates noticed.
0:25:41 > 0:25:44You know, the registration numbers weren't taken.
0:25:44 > 0:25:45It was just a black taxi.
0:25:45 > 0:25:50- But Jimmy, they'd a taxi full of knives and hatchets.- Yeah.
0:25:50 > 0:25:55If I listen to some people from the Catholic community, you weren't trying to find these Butchers.
0:25:55 > 0:26:01You and your men were turning a blind eye to these killers.
0:26:01 > 0:26:04That's absolute nonsense.
0:26:04 > 0:26:06These people were killers,
0:26:06 > 0:26:11they were killing innocent, purely innocent victims,
0:26:11 > 0:26:13people who were involved in nothing,
0:26:13 > 0:26:17brutality, savagery, horrific killings,
0:26:17 > 0:26:20and we wanted to catch them
0:26:20 > 0:26:25and we put every effort that we could into catching them.
0:26:27 > 0:26:31But it didn't stop Catholics being killed.
0:26:31 > 0:26:36My understanding of it was that had these victims been Protestants,
0:26:36 > 0:26:40this would never have been allowed to go on for as long as it did.
0:26:40 > 0:26:44Basically, it said, yous are like dogs on the street.
0:26:44 > 0:26:47Yous are second-class citizens, yous don't matter anyway,
0:26:47 > 0:26:51this is our country, and if we want to take somebody out
0:26:51 > 0:26:55and we want to cut them to pieces, that's fine, we'll do that, we have done it.
0:26:55 > 0:26:57Look at us, we're getting away with it.
0:27:00 > 0:27:05Some people speculated that it might have suited the security forces
0:27:05 > 0:27:08to build up this tension within the two communities,
0:27:08 > 0:27:11because it certainly did build up terrible tension.
0:27:11 > 0:27:18Are you telling me that innocent Catholics were literally having their throats slit
0:27:18 > 0:27:23and the British establishment knew who was doing it?
0:27:23 > 0:27:26Yes, I firmly believe that.
0:27:26 > 0:27:29The RUC Special Branch,
0:27:29 > 0:27:33MI5 and Military Intelligence
0:27:33 > 0:27:37had infiltrated the IRA to the highest level.
0:27:37 > 0:27:43Do you mean to tell me that they weren't able to infiltrate the Shankill Butchers?
0:27:47 > 0:27:54We tried everything possible to solve all murders,
0:27:54 > 0:27:57no matter by whom they were carried out.
0:27:57 > 0:28:03We didn't go after loyalist paramilitaries or republican paramilitaries.
0:28:03 > 0:28:05We went after killers.
0:28:07 > 0:28:12Jimmy Nesbitt insists no informants were able to penetrate the gang.
0:28:12 > 0:28:14He's equally adamant Murphy himself
0:28:14 > 0:28:20was not in any way controlled by police, army or intelligence forces.
0:28:20 > 0:28:23That's utterly impossible.
0:28:23 > 0:28:27- How impossible? You might not have known?- I would have known.
0:28:27 > 0:28:31Murphy certainly was in no way being controlled by anyone.
0:28:31 > 0:28:34The very nature of how they work, they wouldn't have told you.
0:28:34 > 0:28:38- They wouldn't have told me.- How can you tell me it didn't happen?
0:28:38 > 0:28:42I know from all the investigations over a period of months and all the rest of it.
0:28:42 > 0:28:50You can read people, you get to know people and that, and Murphy was not an informant type.
0:28:50 > 0:28:53He was out to commit murder
0:28:53 > 0:28:57and he wasn't going to collaborate with the forces of law and order.
0:29:01 > 0:29:06Luckily for the police, Lenny Murphy was about to make his first mistake.
0:29:14 > 0:29:19In March '76, two women were driving along the Cliftonville Road
0:29:19 > 0:29:23when they were shot at from a passing vehicle.
0:29:23 > 0:29:27The gunmen abandoned their car and set it on fire on this street...
0:29:29 > 0:29:33..right next to the loyalist heartland of Mount Vernon.
0:29:33 > 0:29:37A witness saw a man acting suspiciously and called the police.
0:29:37 > 0:29:40They searched the street and found a gun.
0:29:40 > 0:29:44Next morning, with the street under surveillance,
0:29:44 > 0:29:47the man came back to look for the gun and was arrested.
0:29:47 > 0:29:50That man was Lenny Murphy.
0:29:51 > 0:29:56Murphy was jailed for possession of a firearm with intent to endanger life.
0:29:56 > 0:30:00The police might not have reckoned they'd caught the master Butcher,
0:30:00 > 0:30:03but many on the Shankill did.
0:30:03 > 0:30:08To the whole city's horror, the killings continued.
0:30:08 > 0:30:13'Cornelius Neeson is the 25th person to have died in North Belfast this year.'
0:30:16 > 0:30:23Victim number five was another Catholic, randomly targeted at night within a square mile of Millfield.
0:30:25 > 0:30:29The killing bore all the hallmarks of the Shankill Butchers.
0:30:33 > 0:30:38Cornelius Neeson had been hacked repeatedly to death.
0:30:44 > 0:30:48Murphy remained in jail for six years.
0:30:48 > 0:30:52He might not have been physically out there on the streets,
0:30:52 > 0:30:53but he still called the shots.
0:30:53 > 0:30:57You see, he was determined the killings would continue.
0:30:57 > 0:31:00So he directed them from his prison cell.
0:31:02 > 0:31:07And the man he called on to carry on the killing was William Moore.
0:31:11 > 0:31:14For the Shankill Butchers, it was business as usual.
0:31:34 > 0:31:37Like most teenagers, Stephen McCann wanted to get out and socialise.
0:31:37 > 0:31:41When he and his sister, Delia, were old enough, they managed
0:31:41 > 0:31:47to persuade their parents to allow them come to a disco here at the Queen's students' union.
0:31:53 > 0:31:56I can remember taking the bus and going with friends to it.
0:31:56 > 0:31:58It was very exciting to be there.
0:31:58 > 0:32:03It felt like you were joining into the proper night life now out in the city, type of thing.
0:32:05 > 0:32:08He'd got all new clothes that day too, hadn't he?
0:32:08 > 0:32:12- He's got all new clothes... - He was just looking forward to...
0:32:12 > 0:32:15He was just bouncing. He was probably looking forward to a good night out.
0:32:15 > 0:32:18He was always in the middle of everything.
0:32:18 > 0:32:22He was just a very, very popular guy.
0:32:25 > 0:32:27Delia, you were the last to see him?
0:32:27 > 0:32:29The last of the family, yeah.
0:32:31 > 0:32:34I remember talking to him in the students' union before he left.
0:32:34 > 0:32:38And he had on a new duffle coat he'd bought that week
0:32:38 > 0:32:40and a new shirt.
0:32:40 > 0:32:44I think I admired him and off he went to the party.
0:32:44 > 0:32:45That's the last time I saw him.
0:32:48 > 0:32:51Got out of the car,
0:32:51 > 0:32:57saw the body lying several yards up on the waste ground,
0:32:57 > 0:32:58walked towards it.
0:32:58 > 0:33:00I knew it was another one.
0:33:02 > 0:33:07'Stephen McCann was a schoolboy, murdered on his way home from a disco.
0:33:07 > 0:33:11'His death has a profound effect on the youngsters around him.'
0:33:12 > 0:33:17He died from the bullet wound of the head. That went
0:33:17 > 0:33:20into vital parts of the brain
0:33:20 > 0:33:23and he wouldn't have survived that.
0:33:23 > 0:33:31The cutthroat wound was the contributory, but less important factor.
0:33:34 > 0:33:39I got up the following morning, knew nothing about anything except that
0:33:39 > 0:33:43sister Sheila and my auntie Shelia was sitting at the edge of the bed.
0:33:43 > 0:33:45I woke up. I remember very, very well
0:33:45 > 0:33:49putting on a football boot and just chatting, "Oh, is he OK?"
0:33:49 > 0:33:52Very casually. And she said, "Just stop, he's dead."
0:34:00 > 0:34:02I suppose the lights went out, then, you know?
0:34:04 > 0:34:05Sorry.
0:34:06 > 0:34:10It's such a shocking thing to have happened.
0:34:11 > 0:34:15In some ways, I think I've never been able to bear to think about it.
0:34:29 > 0:34:31A horrendous experience for them.
0:34:31 > 0:34:33Tragic.
0:34:33 > 0:34:38A young man with his whole life in front of him
0:34:38 > 0:34:40coming home from a disco.
0:34:40 > 0:34:44He's suddenly taken and thrown into oblivion.
0:34:46 > 0:34:50By this stage, had you narrowed down the suspects in any way?
0:34:50 > 0:34:56No. No witnesses, no clues.
0:34:56 > 0:34:58Nothing.
0:34:58 > 0:35:00- It's extraordinary, isn't it?- It is.
0:35:06 > 0:35:10I was genuinely as shocked as anyone else when I suddenly read
0:35:10 > 0:35:11the accounts and I thought,
0:35:11 > 0:35:15"Hang on a second, here's some people I know. This is not what they're doing."
0:35:15 > 0:35:22Psychologist Geoffrey Beattie was brought up in Ligoniel, a Protestant enclave in North Belfast.
0:35:22 > 0:35:25As a youngster, he was in a gang with Jim "The Bomber" Watt,
0:35:25 > 0:35:31who went on to become a peripheral member of the Shankill Butchers gang.
0:35:31 > 0:35:33He wasn't that vicious.
0:35:33 > 0:35:34There were people at that time
0:35:34 > 0:35:37who I would describe as much, much more vicious, much harder.
0:35:37 > 0:35:40Jim Watt, I couldn't have foreseen it.
0:35:40 > 0:35:45If you'd given me a list of names and said to me, one of these is going to become a Shankill Butcher,
0:35:45 > 0:35:47I definitely wouldn't have got it right.
0:35:47 > 0:35:51You've been there, in a gang, and then, of course, as a psychologist,
0:35:51 > 0:35:57you must have an understanding then of the weaker members of a gang and that leader having a massive impact?
0:35:57 > 0:36:03Some of the weaker members of the gang are kind of bound into the gang partly through fear of the leader.
0:36:03 > 0:36:06And what kind of fear is it? Partly fear of rejection
0:36:06 > 0:36:10because you're much more vulnerable when you're on your own.
0:36:10 > 0:36:13You might be uncomfortable with what you're doing at times
0:36:13 > 0:36:16but the trauma of being rejected by the group might just outdo it.
0:36:16 > 0:36:19So you stay part of it and you do whatever he asks.
0:36:21 > 0:36:24For three months, there was a lull.
0:36:26 > 0:36:29But then the cutthroat murders started up again.
0:36:31 > 0:36:34I remember one of the girls saying to me, you know,
0:36:34 > 0:36:37"God, did you hear they've found another body?"
0:36:37 > 0:36:39And I was like "Oh, my God, you're not serious!
0:36:39 > 0:36:42"That's somebody's husband or somebody's son."
0:36:42 > 0:36:46And the day went on and it was on the news reports and the whole bit
0:36:46 > 0:36:50and I didn't connect at all with it.
0:36:53 > 0:37:01Like so many victims before him, Joseph Morrissey was abducted in the usual place - the Millfield area.
0:37:01 > 0:37:06He'd been into the city centre for a few drinks and was on his way home to North Belfast.
0:37:06 > 0:37:14His body was discovered in the Glencairn estate, three miles from Millfield.
0:37:14 > 0:37:19He'd been dumped on the ground, right beside this kerb.
0:37:21 > 0:37:25After I'd been told it was my father,
0:37:25 > 0:37:30I looked over into the corner and my mother was sitting holding herself.
0:37:30 > 0:37:33Rocking back and forward on the chair.
0:37:33 > 0:37:35Just crying, you know.
0:37:35 > 0:37:38"Jesus, not my Joe, not my Joe!"
0:37:41 > 0:37:44Her Joe was gone,
0:37:44 > 0:37:45you know?
0:37:47 > 0:37:50And I kind of knew, just from looking at her,
0:37:50 > 0:37:55that, you know, it probably would have been kinder
0:37:55 > 0:37:58if God had taken her then.
0:38:00 > 0:38:03Didn't speak, wouldn't wash herself,
0:38:03 > 0:38:06wouldn't eat. She was pathetically thin.
0:38:06 > 0:38:10Crying all the time. This wonderful, vibrant woman that we'd known,
0:38:10 > 0:38:12all gone.
0:38:12 > 0:38:14Everything gone.
0:38:14 > 0:38:21Almost like somebody had ripped inside her body and taken out anything
0:38:21 > 0:38:23that was of any value.
0:38:25 > 0:38:31His eyes weren't closed properly, and that's how I knew who he was.
0:38:31 > 0:38:34He had the most amazing blue eyes.
0:38:35 > 0:38:38Pieces of his body had been removed.
0:38:38 > 0:38:42And his nose hadn't been stitched back on properly.
0:38:42 > 0:38:45He was practically decapitated.
0:38:45 > 0:38:51I was very conscious when I bent down to kiss him that his head was very...
0:38:53 > 0:38:56They had a steel brace coming up from the top of his spine.
0:38:56 > 0:39:00And something around his neck to support his head.
0:39:01 > 0:39:07And, of course, he was covered up to the chin because of the horrific injuries to his neck.
0:39:13 > 0:39:20In March '77, Francis Cassidy became the latest cutthroat victim.
0:39:20 > 0:39:26Just another man making his way home from the pub. This time,
0:39:26 > 0:39:30the body was dumped in a different police patch.
0:39:30 > 0:39:33The Butchers had now been slaughtering people for 18 months.
0:39:36 > 0:39:40And the police were still no closer to catching them.
0:39:44 > 0:39:49Just over a month later, though, detectives had a lead that was staring them in the face.
0:39:49 > 0:39:54A kidnap victim of the Shankill Butchers survived to tell the tale.
0:39:56 > 0:39:58I was going up to Cliftonville Road,
0:39:58 > 0:40:03up home, and they stopped
0:40:03 > 0:40:05and told me they were CID.
0:40:05 > 0:40:09They said to me that I was wanted in Tennent Street.
0:40:09 > 0:40:13I thought they were CID
0:40:13 > 0:40:16so I went into the car with them.
0:40:22 > 0:40:27On 10th May, Gerard McLaverty was on his way home around 11.30 from a friend's house.
0:40:27 > 0:40:31He was abducted and taken to a building on the Shankill Road.
0:40:31 > 0:40:35It had been a doctor's surgery, but was now derelict.
0:40:37 > 0:40:41This white building is where Gerard was taken to.
0:40:41 > 0:40:44Again, it's right here in the heart of the Shankill Road.
0:40:44 > 0:40:48While ordinary people were going about their normal lives,
0:40:48 > 0:40:55little did they know that Gerard would be taken in there for several hours and beaten and tortured.
0:40:59 > 0:41:01Meat cleavers, pokers.
0:41:01 > 0:41:05They just tortured,
0:41:05 > 0:41:07tortured and tortured me.
0:41:07 > 0:41:13They asked me if I wanted tea, which I said no.
0:41:13 > 0:41:18They cut my wrists.
0:41:18 > 0:41:22They put a boot-lace wire around my neck,
0:41:22 > 0:41:24which they thought they had
0:41:24 > 0:41:26already got me strangled.
0:41:30 > 0:41:35In the early hours of the next morning, Gerard was dragged into an entry and left for dead.
0:41:35 > 0:41:38But, somehow, he had survived.
0:41:38 > 0:41:40He was rushed to hospital.
0:41:40 > 0:41:44We were informed that it was an assault.
0:41:44 > 0:41:48But when the detectives spoke to him
0:41:48 > 0:41:51and he showed him the knife wounds,
0:41:51 > 0:41:57they then immediately became very aware that this was something important.
0:42:02 > 0:42:08On the morning of the 18th May 1977, we brought Gerard McLaverty
0:42:08 > 0:42:13to this location here outside the BRA on the Cliftonville Road.
0:42:13 > 0:42:17A week after his abduction, Gerard McLaverty
0:42:17 > 0:42:21retraced his journey with two police officers from Tennent Street.
0:42:21 > 0:42:27- Where are we going to now? - Going down the Woodvale Road on to the Shankill Road.
0:42:28 > 0:42:33Just about here, there were three men walking citywards
0:42:33 > 0:42:37on the footpath, and Gerry McLaverty nearly jumped out of the back of the car.
0:42:37 > 0:42:41He says, "See that big fat fucker in the middle? That's one of them."
0:42:41 > 0:42:45The man he identified was Sam McAllister.
0:42:45 > 0:42:50We drove on down to Berlin Street.
0:42:51 > 0:42:55We got Gerry to keep down
0:42:55 > 0:42:58and drove down the length of Berlin Street, turned the car
0:42:58 > 0:43:01and come back up the Shankill Road again, countrywards.
0:43:01 > 0:43:04He thought he'd seen the guy that had tried to kill him?
0:43:04 > 0:43:08Yes. He was quite excited about it.
0:43:08 > 0:43:10When we were coming back up, he says,
0:43:10 > 0:43:13"See that boy with the white trousers, that's another one of them."
0:43:13 > 0:43:18We knew him to be a man called Benjamin "Pretty Boy" Edwards.
0:43:18 > 0:43:21So he identified two of them.
0:43:21 > 0:43:25When we were bringing Gerry back to Tennent Street
0:43:25 > 0:43:28police station, he said to us, "You see that big fat fucker?
0:43:28 > 0:43:33"When he was interrogating me, he rolled up his shirt sleeve
0:43:33 > 0:43:38"and he says 'Look at that, you Fenian bastard! War wound.' "
0:43:38 > 0:43:46So we knew then that if McAllister had a hole in his arm, that it was a very good identification.
0:43:46 > 0:43:50The police arrested McAllister at dawn the next morning and when
0:43:50 > 0:43:57they checked his arms, sure enough they found the scars of two wounds.
0:43:57 > 0:44:00Now, when the police lifted the floorboards of McAllister's house,
0:44:00 > 0:44:06they found a six-inch steak knife and two ten-inch boning knives.
0:44:09 > 0:44:11Nothing was found on them.
0:44:11 > 0:44:14They'd all been meticulously cleaned.
0:44:14 > 0:44:19Now, Gerry McLaverty was also able to give a description
0:44:19 > 0:44:23which would have fitted Billy Moore
0:44:23 > 0:44:26and we knew that he had previously owned a black taxi
0:44:26 > 0:44:30and he also now owned a yellow Cortina.
0:44:30 > 0:44:34And Gerry described how he'd been taken away in a yellow Cortina.
0:44:34 > 0:44:41Fibres found inside the car turned out to be from the clothing of Gerard McLaverty.
0:44:41 > 0:44:46So it was a case we could prove.
0:44:49 > 0:44:54William Moore confessed to the kidnap of Gerard McLaverty.
0:44:54 > 0:44:59But there was still no forensic links to the Shankill Butchers' other victims.
0:44:59 > 0:45:02Unless somebody talked.
0:45:04 > 0:45:09We had then a man admitting kidnapping Gerard McLaverty.
0:45:09 > 0:45:13So to tie him in
0:45:13 > 0:45:16to the other cutthroat killings,
0:45:16 > 0:45:18that was another matter.
0:45:21 > 0:45:26Two days later, it's 10am in the morning and Moore was questioned about the cutthroat murders.
0:45:26 > 0:45:30He said. "I had nothing to do with them."
0:45:30 > 0:45:38Now, at lunchtime, he was being led back to his cell when he stopped and said "Wait, I want to see you.
0:45:38 > 0:45:40"I can help you.
0:45:40 > 0:45:42"I know about the throat cuttings,"
0:45:42 > 0:45:44he said. And then he went on,
0:45:44 > 0:45:48"I don't know what to do, I'm scared."
0:45:49 > 0:45:55Moore was sent back to his cell for the afternoon to think over what he had said.
0:45:55 > 0:45:58We looked in on him from time to time.
0:45:58 > 0:46:00It was obvious that
0:46:00 > 0:46:03he was under pressure, he was beginning to wilt.
0:46:03 > 0:46:05So now it's a waiting game?
0:46:05 > 0:46:10Not so much wondering about it as expecting it.
0:46:16 > 0:46:20May 21st, 7.35pm
0:46:20 > 0:46:23and Moore is brought back into the interrogation room again.
0:46:23 > 0:46:28At this point, he admits his involvement in all the throat cuttings.
0:46:28 > 0:46:30Here's what he says.
0:46:30 > 0:46:35"Murphy done the first three and I done the rest."
0:46:35 > 0:46:43When he was asked why, he said, "It was on Murphy's instructions while Murphy was in jail.
0:46:45 > 0:46:48"It was that bastard Murphy who led me into all this."
0:46:52 > 0:46:59We had Murphy produced from jail to Castlereagh on a number of occasions and interviewed him.
0:46:59 > 0:47:02What was he like in the interview room?
0:47:02 > 0:47:06Totally dismissive. Laughed at the whole thing.
0:47:06 > 0:47:11Later, we asked Moore and Bates
0:47:11 > 0:47:14to consider giving evidence against Murphy.
0:47:14 > 0:47:19And, in fact, they agreed to do so and they made statements naming Murphy.
0:47:19 > 0:47:23But then they later retracted those statements
0:47:23 > 0:47:25because of fear.
0:47:28 > 0:47:34Moore, Bates and McAllister were quick to excuse their part in the murders.
0:47:34 > 0:47:38They said, "We decided to go and get chips.
0:47:38 > 0:47:40"We couldn't find a chippy open.
0:47:42 > 0:47:44"Somebody suggested we go and get a taig."
0:47:52 > 0:47:58But Murphy's three henchmen, along with eight others, did confess their involvement in the murders.
0:47:58 > 0:48:01Over the next two years, they also confessed to their involvement
0:48:01 > 0:48:08in the killings of 11 other people - Catholics and Protestants.
0:48:08 > 0:48:10They shot five men in a bar.
0:48:10 > 0:48:15They murdered two Protestant lorry men they THOUGHT were Catholics.
0:48:18 > 0:48:22They killed three men during loyalist feuding.
0:48:22 > 0:48:26And they murdered a 10-year-old boy when they bombed an Easter parade.
0:48:26 > 0:48:34With 19 murders between them, they were, at the time, the most prolific serial killers in British history.
0:48:45 > 0:48:47After you, sir.
0:48:52 > 0:48:59In February 1979, the Crumlin Road courthouse in Belfast was packed to the rafters with the world's press
0:48:59 > 0:49:02to hear the sentences on the Shankill Butchers.
0:49:07 > 0:49:13- Bring me back, what was happening around here?- Well, you had relatives of all the accused.
0:49:13 > 0:49:17You had victims' relatives,
0:49:17 > 0:49:20you had police, you had barristers.
0:49:20 > 0:49:23And really, really tight security here.
0:49:25 > 0:49:27I remember there were 11 of them.
0:49:27 > 0:49:29They all couldn't fit into the dock.
0:49:29 > 0:49:32Some of them had to sit outside here,
0:49:32 > 0:49:34and on the far side.
0:49:34 > 0:49:36This is where they were.
0:49:38 > 0:49:41Here, they came up here. All these guys were handcuffed
0:49:41 > 0:49:46when they were brought up in the dock, one by one, handcuffs taken off, take their seats.
0:49:46 > 0:49:50The place was crackling with tension.
0:49:50 > 0:49:54These were people who'd decided enough was enough, they were going to own up to this.
0:49:54 > 0:50:00Out comes Lord Justice O'Donnell then for sentencing. What happens?
0:50:00 > 0:50:02They all get to their feet.
0:50:02 > 0:50:06And there's a clerk who read out all the charges.
0:50:06 > 0:50:08It must have gone on for over half an hour.
0:50:08 > 0:50:10"How do you plead?" "Guilty."
0:50:10 > 0:50:12"How do you plead?" "Guilty."
0:50:14 > 0:50:20The judge said the murders would stand as a monument to "blind sectarian bigotry".
0:50:21 > 0:50:27He sentenced the gang to a total of nearly 2,000 years in prison.
0:50:29 > 0:50:33But, in the naming of names, one was missing...
0:50:37 > 0:50:38..Lenny Murphy.
0:50:40 > 0:50:43That was the one name on everybody's lips.
0:50:43 > 0:50:46That was the one name, the master Butcher,
0:50:46 > 0:50:48that we couldn't name.
0:50:48 > 0:50:53The judge knew who we were talking about, the barristers certainly knew who we were talking about,
0:50:53 > 0:50:56the boys in the dock knew who we were talking about.
0:50:57 > 0:51:00The Shankill Butchers
0:51:00 > 0:51:01was a bad time for the Shankill.
0:51:01 > 0:51:04These things were being done in the Protestant name.
0:51:04 > 0:51:06Protestant people didn't want it, but they didn't
0:51:06 > 0:51:11have the courage to stand up and say, "This is not being done in our name."
0:51:11 > 0:51:16It was probably unfair to the people of the Shankill to call them the Shankill Butchers.
0:51:16 > 0:51:19It sort of put a slur on the whole road, didn't it, in a way?
0:51:19 > 0:51:22We don't blame people on the Shankill for what a few people did.
0:51:22 > 0:51:25And I have to tell you as well,
0:51:25 > 0:51:28before Stephen was buried, with all the comings and goings
0:51:28 > 0:51:32were at the house, there was two ladies came and I opened the door to them.
0:51:32 > 0:51:34They introduced them as two ladies from the Shankill Road.
0:51:34 > 0:51:37And they didn't want to come in, they just said who they were,
0:51:37 > 0:51:39where they were from and they were very sorry.
0:51:39 > 0:51:43And that was one of the most touching things that happened at that time.
0:51:43 > 0:51:45It meant an awful lot to us.
0:51:45 > 0:51:47It really did.
0:51:49 > 0:51:51I felt there was a wee bit of hope.
0:51:59 > 0:52:03Three years after the trial, Murphy was released from jail.
0:52:03 > 0:52:10But his own sentence - a death sentence - was only three months away.
0:52:10 > 0:52:12In that time, he'd become suspected of more murders.
0:52:12 > 0:52:19But, in November 1982, murder caught up with Lenny Murphy.
0:52:19 > 0:52:25He was shot in Glencairn, the same estate where many of the Butchers' victims were dumped.
0:52:28 > 0:52:33It was people from within Murphy's own constituency.
0:52:33 > 0:52:38People who were very well known in the loyalist paramilitary underworld.
0:52:38 > 0:52:42They were the people who pointed the finger at Lenny Murphy.
0:52:42 > 0:52:46They were the people who gave the IRA gunmen directions to his door.
0:52:46 > 0:52:51They told them where he would be at a certain time in the day, and that's how the IRA shot him.
0:52:55 > 0:52:58But, even in death, the master Butcher found
0:52:58 > 0:53:03enough support in his own community to put a protective ring around him.
0:53:04 > 0:53:07Go over to the other side.
0:53:07 > 0:53:09You're not getting any photos.
0:53:15 > 0:53:19On his headstone, he was honoured as a military hero.
0:53:32 > 0:53:37To this day, there are still some who would glorify the Shankill Butchers.
0:53:40 > 0:53:44In 1997, with the Good Friday Agreement less than a year away,
0:53:44 > 0:53:49more than 1,000 lined the streets for Robert Bates' funeral.
0:53:49 > 0:53:55On her way home from work, Charlotte Morrissey was caught up in the procession.
0:53:57 > 0:54:00I had to stay in my car for two and a half hours and...
0:54:00 > 0:54:07there were huge wreaths.
0:54:09 > 0:54:13For me it was like they were honouring some sort of a hero.
0:54:17 > 0:54:22You know, and is that what people really thought about the Shankill Butchers?
0:54:22 > 0:54:23Were they heroes?
0:54:24 > 0:54:30I found myself trapped in the car, unable to get out or speak.
0:54:30 > 0:54:37I can't tell you how I felt, but, for me, the message was, you know, he was a hero.
0:54:39 > 0:54:44The man, who cut my father to pieces and tortured him for three hours, was a hero.
0:54:53 > 0:54:59When William Moore died in 2009, a death notice paid tribute to him
0:54:59 > 0:55:03with the same epitaph inscribed on Lenny Murphy's headstone.
0:55:08 > 0:55:10My father was a soldier.
0:55:10 > 0:55:13My father fought in two world wars.
0:55:13 > 0:55:15They were REAL heroes.
0:55:15 > 0:55:17Lenny Murphy wasn't a hero.
0:55:17 > 0:55:22He was a murdering thug who got away with the most atrocious murders.
0:55:22 > 0:55:27But that isn't to say there aren't people on the Shankill who possibly look at him in a different light.
0:55:33 > 0:55:36As we look back now, you take a slight comfort
0:55:36 > 0:55:41from the fact the Shankill Butchers and the killings were so long ago.
0:55:41 > 0:55:45But how much of this sectarianism that allowed that to happen is still embedded?
0:55:45 > 0:55:48Sectarianism's still very much part of both communities.
0:55:48 > 0:55:51It's the cancer that we haven't dealt with.
0:55:51 > 0:55:54So, when I ask you if you think something like the Shankill Butchers
0:55:54 > 0:56:00- could ever happen again, unless we actually really tackle sectarianism, the answer's got to be yes?- Yes.
0:56:06 > 0:56:1019 people died at the hands of the Shankill Butchers.
0:56:10 > 0:56:17Though their sadistic aim was to kill Catholics, nine who got in their way were Protestants.
0:56:17 > 0:56:23Some people say they were worse than the other notorious serial killer who was on the loose at the time.
0:56:23 > 0:56:28The Yorkshire Ripper said he heard voices urging him to kill.
0:56:28 > 0:56:32The Shankill Butchers just heard the sound of their own hatred.
0:56:35 > 0:56:38They used the troubles for what they did.
0:56:38 > 0:56:42And what they did was no more than serial killing.
0:56:42 > 0:56:50In a normal society, these people would be shunned by the members of their community.
0:56:50 > 0:56:58On this occasion, Lenny Murphy was let loose on society, and society paid a terrible price for it.
0:57:00 > 0:57:02The family was never the same again.
0:57:06 > 0:57:10You could see from today, all this time later, the upset that's still...
0:57:10 > 0:57:12and will still continue to cause.
0:57:14 > 0:57:19It's hard to believe that there would be such...
0:57:19 > 0:57:24cruelty on such a very, very deep level.
0:57:24 > 0:57:25Hatred.
0:57:25 > 0:57:29Hatred because, what, I'm a Catholic?
0:57:29 > 0:57:32Because my father was a different religion?
0:57:32 > 0:57:39A good man, a hard-working man who brought up his children to be good human beings.
0:57:39 > 0:57:46And to take him and torture him and beat him and cut him and remove parts of his body?
0:57:48 > 0:57:52It's beyond my comprehension, it really is.
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