A Raid in Londondderry, Northern IrelandBy Malcolm Garcia
Eammon Kelly lives in a Catholic neighborhood in Londonderry, Northern Ireland located about seventy miles outside of Belfast. On August 26, 1996, he began his day as usual by going to work. That evening he arrived home at five o'clock in time for tea. His sister and brother were home, as well as a friend of the family with her three year old boy. Fifteen minutes later the raid began.
Eammon, 23, was slumped on a couch in the living room when he spoke to me less than an hour after the raid. His face was pale and he continually crossed and re-crossed his arms and legs. "We were sitting in the house," Eammon said in a shaking voice, "and the next thing we see is about fifteen police officers busting in the front door. No, they didn't knock, jeez no. They just ran in and started shouting, 'ye bastards get on the ground. Get on the ground. We'll blow your heads in."'
I was in Londonderry as a free lance journalist when my landlady told me about the Kelly raid, only one block away. I arrived at the Kellys as the police were leaving, filing out of the house in pairs carrying rifles. I counted ten officers. More were loitering behind a military land rover. I was not allowed to enter the house until the police had departed.
The Kelly's were raided under Title 14 of the Prevention of Terrorism Act (PTA) which permits wide powers of arrest, detention and search by the British military and the Royal Ulster Constabulary (R.U.C.), the local police force. The Act not only criminilizes the use of violence for political ends but also many other activities as well; belonging to banned organizations, collecting money or materials for a banned organization, encouraging others to support banned organizations by, for example, having a public or private meeting with more than two people present. Any one of these allegations can prompt a raid...
I wonder if Mr. Garcia's articles, here, about leftists in the Congress who are pro-new departmentia, will include his '97 observations or also be pro-leftist. Is he titillating so as to stir up some real meat or another social anarchist?