'Soldier shot against guidelines'

Victims' relatives are waiting their turn in the inquiry

The Saville Inquiry has heard that one of the shots fired on Bloody Sunday may not have been justified under British Army guidelines.

The evidence suggested that soldier "V" had seen a man throw a bottle with a fuse attached, during a civil rights demonstration in Londonderry on 30 January 1972, and had opened fire.

Counsel to the inquiry Christopher Clarke QC told the tribunal that petrol bombs were not among the weapons which allowed soldiers to fire under the Yellow Card, the army's guidelines on when to shoot.

The inquiry, which is being held at Derry's Guildhall, is investigating events when British paratroopers opened fire on the protest in the city's Bogside, killing 14 people.

Jack Duddy's death

The evidence heard on Wednesday was an account which had been given by Paratropper Lance Corporal "V" to the Royal Military Police (RMP) and to a Treasury Department solicitor 28 years ago.

The tribunal heard the solicitor had been planning to warn "V" his statement could incriminate him, after hearing his unrecorded version of events, but that an army officer had then threatened to order the soldier not to give the statement.

A priest tries to get the wounded to hospital

Mr Clarke also said "V"'s new statement had alleged for the first time that machine gun fire was directed at him after he got out of an armoured personnel carrier on wasteground off Rossville Street in the Bogside.

He said the tribunal would have to consider that it may have been "V" who had shot 17-year-old Jack Duddy and that he may have been killed by a bullet intended for the man who had allegedly thrown the bottle.

"V" had claimed in 1972 he had heard high velocity single rifle shots coming from an alleyway between two of the high-rise Rossville Flats.

In a statement given to the RMP that year, "V" had claimed he saw a male person throw a bottle with a fuse attached at the end.

He had claimed the bottle had hit the ground but had not exploded.

As the man who threw it had moved from the crowd "I fired one 7.62 mm round at him", he had said in his statement.

Statement could incriminate

The Saville Inquiry also heard details of an exchange between John Heritage, of the Treasury Solicitors' Department, and the soldier before he was due to have taken the statement from "V".

A file note dated 5 March 1972 recounted: "In the course of my preliminary interview with "V", before recording his statement, I invited him to tell me his account of what happened.

"He told me he saw a man throwing a bottle with a lighted fuse at its end.

Notice on Bloody Sunday memorial calls for justice

"The bottle landed near (soldier) "S" but the fuse came out in the air and the bottle did not explode.

"As soon as the movement of the crowd gave him a clear sight of the man, he shot at him and believed that he had hit him.

"I asked him if he could see anything in his hand, he answered, `No sir, I couldn't honestly say that I did'."

The process had been suspended while Colonel Ted Overbury, an army legal officer, had discussed the conversation with counsel and he had later told Mr Heritage that he proposed to order "V" to make a statement.

Mr Heritage had claimed he said that if "V" made a statement, he would have to warn him that his evidence could incriminate him, but Col Overbury had said in such a case he would order or advise "V" not to make a statement.

He had later learned that Col Overbury's position had been based on advice that a statement made in compliance with military orders could not be used against its maker in subsequent proceedings.

However he had believed the inquiry's authority would override that.

Firing 'not justified'

Mr Clarke told the tribunal that petrol bombs were not among the weapons of attack which allowed soldiers to open fire under the Yellow Card.

Later he said: "If the account given to the RMP and to Mr Heritage is accurate, the tribunal may feel that firing was not justified, either by the Yellow Card or at all."

Lord Saville: heading the inquiry at Derry's Guildhall

The tribunal, headed by Lord Saville, is expected to sit for two years.

No-one can be prosecuted on the strength of evidence submitted to the inquiry, which was set up by the government solely to find the truth of what happened on Bloody Sunday.

The Widgery Inquiry held shortly after the shootings in 1972, exonerated the soldiers involved, who said they had been fired on by the IRA, before they themselves opened fire.

But the truth about who fired the first shots on Bloody Sunday has never been conclusively established and relatives of those killed and injured campaigned for a new inquiry because they felt the first ignored important evidence.