Nelson affair allegation sparks furious reaction
Friends and former colleagues of Lurgan solicitor Rosemary Nelson have reacted furiously to police claims that she was having an affair with a leading republican in Co Armagh.
The claim has been made by an anonymous police witness at the public inquiry into the murder of the 40-year-old mother-of-three in a loyalist bomb attack almost 10 years ago.
Ms Nelson's solicitor, Barra McGrory, has described allegations that she was unduly sympathetic to republicans as "unfounded and malicious".
One of her former clients, Brendan MacCionnaith, has also described the police claims as "character assassination" designed to justify her murder.
There have long been suspicions that the security forces in the North helped the loyalists who planted a bomb beneath Ms Nelson’s car in March 1999.
