The Murder of Seamus Ludlow in County Louth, May 1976. Towards a public inquiry?
The Murder of Seamus Ludlow in County Louth, May 1976. Towards a public inquiry?
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Introduction to the murder of Seamus Ludlow and the official cover-up. Michael Cunningham investigation - 1978 The recent Campaign for Truth and Justice. Irish Victims Commission Report. Ludlow family's questions for the RUC (now the PSNI). Jim J. Kane's letter to the N I Human Rights Commission. Jim J. Kane's letter to the RUC Ludlow Family Letter to Bertie Ahern Other Ludlow Family Sites. |
The Irish News, 19 February 1999: Gardai accused of killing cover-up By Michael O'Toole Dublin Correspondent The family of a Dundalk man murdered more than 20 years ago yesterday accused gardai of hiding the truth about loyalist involvement in his death. And relatives of murder victim Seamus Ludlow - who held a public meeting in the Co Louth town last night - also revealed they are considering plans to sue officers who were involved in the original investigations. Mr Ludlow's family yesterday claimed his killer was a notorious loyalist in the Red Hand Commando, a UVF offshoot, who has openly boasted of his role in a string of murders including the October 1976 assassination of Sinn Fein Vice President Maire Drumm. Mr Ludlow (47) was found dead in an isolated laneway between Dundalk and Newry in May 1976 - he had been shot three times. Gardai repeatedly told the family that they believed the bachelor was murdered by the IRA, a claim that group strenuously denied when republicans called on a relative's house soon after the murder. The family has long been convinced that loyalists wewre behind the killing and they now believe the truth has been hidden because one of his killers was an agent for the security forces either north or south of the border. Relatives of Mr Ludlow yesterday demanded a public inquiry into the killing Last year a Co Down man told a Sunday newspaper that he had been in the yellow Datsun car in which Mr Ludlow had been killed. He claimed the other men involved in the murder included two serving UDR officers, one of them a captain. Mr Ludlow's nephew Jimmy Sharkey who has been leading the campaign to find out the truth about his uncle's death yesterday said a public inquiry was the only way the truth would come out. He said: "We are calling on the government to open an independent public inquiry. "We feel as a family that this is the only way we are going to be told the truth. For 23 years we have been told that it was the IRA (who killed Mr Ludlow) but they always had all the information, including who killed him. "They have suppressed this evidence and I think one of the reasons for this is that one of the men in the car was an agent or an informer. "As far back as 1979 the guards could have acted on the evidence they had, it was very strong evidence." He said the family would want to take legal action against the officers who investigated the killing and added that he wanted his uncle's killers to serve a long jail sentence.
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