A Midland Irish terror suspect may be
quizzed again over a 28-year-old murder nearly 30 years ago amid claims
that the killer was an informant protected by British authorities.
Samuel Black-Carroll, a loyalist
sympathiser, was one of four men arrested in 1998 in connection with the
tragic death of Catholic Seamus Ludlow in County Louth.
Mr Ludlow, a 47-year-old forestry
worker was shot three times and dumped in a ditch near his Dundalk home
on the Northern Irish border in 1976.
Black-Carroll, 50, from Rugeley, in
Staffordshire, was later released without charge, along with his fellow
suspects.
But pressure from Mr Ludlow's family
led the Irish government to set up an independent inquiry into his death
last year, and former Supreme Court judge Henry Barron will report his
findings in the next two months.
Mr Ludlow's family claim no-one has
ever been charged with his death because the authorities are trying to
protect a terrorist informant who was a member of the Red Hand
Commandos.
"We want a full public inquiry
into my uncle's death," said Mr Ludlow's nephew Jimmy Sharkey.
"We will not give up until the
truth is finally out. The authorities were given the names of my uncle's
killers years ago and have failed to punish them.
"The Irish and British
authorities have colluded to protect them."
Black-Carroll was an associate of John
McKeague, commander of loyalist paramilitary group the Ulster Defence
Association, who was killed by the Irish National Liberation Army in
1982.
Known as Mambo, Black-Carroll moved to
Staffordshire in the late 1980s to look after his late sister's
children. A horse enthusiast, he took work helping out on a farm in
Rugeley.
But he was jailed for two years and
eight months at Wolverhampton Crown Court in February 2000 after he
attacked Ivan Shirley whom he claimed had called him "Semtex
Sam".
It is believed he now spends his time
between Liverpool and Rugeley, where he stays with his niece on the Pear
Tree Estate.
Mr Ludlow's family fear that Justice
Barron's inquiry, which is being conducted in private, could end up
being a whitewash and are calling for a public inquiry instead.
Mr Justice Barron has already released
reports into the Dublin and Monaghan bombings of May 1974 in which 33
people lost their lives.
The papers state there were grounds
for suspecting that British security forces helped loyalist
paramilitaries with the bombings.
Mr Ludlow, 47, a bachelor, lived with
his mother, married sister and her family, in Dundalk. The family have
been granted a second inquest into his death, which should be held early
this year.
"My uncle was a quiet man,"
said Mr Sharkey, 49. "At one stage a false rumour was put out that
he was an IRA informer and that the IRA killed him. The IRA have
publicly stated that they did not."
Last night a spokesman for the Gardai
said their investigation into Mr Ludlow's death was ongoing.
A spokesman for the Government in the
Republic of Ireland said: "I understand that Judge Barron will
report early in the new year on the Dublin bombings of 1972 and 1973 and
on the other cases referred to him.
"These include the Seamus Ludlow
case and the Dundalk bombing of 1975."
