Campaign for Finucane murder case probe goes to US
Senior American politicians are to hear calls tonight for a full public inquiry into the death of murdered solicitor Pat Finucane.
Mr Finucane’s widow Geraldine and his former colleague Peter Madden are in New York pushing for a new judicial inquiry into the lawyer’s murder in Belfast in 1989.
The pair will address the National Committee on American Foreign Policy at a meeting in New York, which last month honoured former Northern Ireland Secretary Mo Mowlam for her part in the peace process.
The British and Irish Governments are also under pressure to agree on a new investigation and Prime Minister Tony Blair has been warned by the nationalist SDLP that it will not sign up to the new policing arrangements unless a probe is ordered.
Leading Catholic solicitor Pat Finucane was shot dead by loyalist gunmen in front of his family at his home in Belfast in February 1989.
His death has been surrounded by constant claims that he died as a result of collusion between the security forces and loyalist paramilitaries - claims which are still the subject of an inquiry by a team headed by Metropolitan Police Commissioner Sir John Stevens.
William Stobie, a former UDA quartermaster who worked as a Special Branch agent, was charged by the Stevens team with aiding and abetting the murder and is still awaiting trial.
Stobie has admitted he provided a gun to a UDA murder squad and warned his police handlers that someone was to be murdered on the night Mr Finucane was killed, but he insisted he did not know who the target was.
There are doubts the case will go ahead because a key prosecution witness may not take to the witness box after claiming he suffers from ill-health.
