Report due on solicitor 'threats'

Rosemary Nelson died in a car bomb in March 1999

The findings of an investigation into the police handling of threats against a murdered Lurgan solicitor are due to be published.

The Police Ombudsman examined how the police dealt with threats against Rosemary Nelson before she was killed.

The mother-of-three was murdered when a loyalist bomb exploded under her car as she left her home in March 1999.

A public inquiry into the murder has been postponed. It is one of four into claims of security force collusion.

The 40-year-old was murdered by the loyalist splinter group, the Red Hand Defenders.

The collusion allegations arose because of Mrs Nelson's role as the legal representative in a number of high profile cases, including the nationalist Garvaghy Road Residents' Coalition.

There have been claims of security force collusion in the killing

Police Ombudsman Nuala O'Loan began an investigation after receiving a complaint from the Belfast-based human rights group, the Committee on the Administration of Justice, (CAJ) one year after the murder.

The CAJ alleged that the then RUC chief constable Sir Ronnie Flanagan had failed to properly investigate written threats against the solicitor.

The committee said it sent copies of the threats to the Northern Ireland Office seven months before Mrs Nelson was killed.

There have also been claims that the police and government failed to act on information about threats against her.

The government agreed to set up an inquiry into Mrs Nelson's death following the recommendations of retired Canadian Judge Peter Cory.