The appeal, which opened on Wednesday (June 17) and will finish on Thursday (June 18), is being heard by Chief Justice Siobhan Keegan, Justice Adrian Colton and Justice Stephen Fowler.

Foyle MP Colum Eastwood and Derry City and Strabane District councillor Brian Tierney (SDLP) were also present in the court on Wednesday.

According to Ms Coyle, the focus in the appeal will be on the reliability of one statement of admission which Mr McDevitt continues to assert was obtained using “oppressive and coercive police interview techniques”.

In his opening statement to the Court of Appeal, Mr Hutton referred to reports there was intelligence on the guns used in the incident prior to their use in the attack.

He also highlighted that a small sub-machine gun had been brought into one of Mr McDevitt’s interviews in Castlereagh Holding Centre and that the RUC interviewers had been “verbally aggressive, threatening, including threatening him with ‘terrorist type interrogation’ which Mr McDevitt took to be a threat of physical violence”.

“[Mr McDevitt] was told there is an easy way or a hard way,” said Mr Hutton. “Officers stated that an admission of carrying guns would make no difference to his case and he would bail and get a suspended sentence if he confessed. And the officer was preventing him from giving his own account of events, and instead, repeatedly telling him, what he had been involved in.”

Mr Hutton moved on to Mr McDevitt’s statement in which he gave an account of what he remembered of his second interview. He said: “Detective Orr insisting I had driven the gunmen. He had left the room, left me with Ross. When he came back, he was carrying a small machine gun. He set it down on the desk and started to point the gun over the table at me stating that the gun was in my car that night.”

Mr Hutton then referred to the 1979 Bennett Report [Report of the Committee of Inquiry into Police Interrogation Procedures in Northern Ireland] – page 447 of the Book of Authorities – which indicates that “an officer bringing a gun into an interview room was pretty strictly prohibited”.

He also stated that the Criminal Cases Review Commission (CCRC) had noted, “Mr McDevitt had stated clearly in his evidence at the trial, that he had been shown a machine gun during his second interview on the afternoon of May 2, 1984. However the results of the Commission’s investigation had indicated that machine gun seized in respect of the other operation had been in the forensic science laboratory at this time, in other words, it had only been in the holding centre on May 3”.

Following a query regarding the different dates from the Chief Justice, Mr Hutton said: “It is absolutely clear Mr McDevitt did say that in his evidence. It is just whether it would be fair to him to have placed reliance on what he said a trial, two and a half years later, about the sequencing of the interviews.”

Mr Huttton also referred to Mr McDevitt’s 2019 submission to CCRC which contained claims against the police officers who interviewed him.

Having considered the Court’s findings in the Latimer case, the CCRC considered that the credibility of the officers as witnesses of truth in criminal proceedings had been substantially weakened.

The referral followed a court decision in another case [Patrick Thompson] referred by the CCRC, which in 2024 resulted in the Court of Appeal quashing a conviction. This was also based on the Latimer case.

After extensive analysis, the CCRC determined there was a real possibility the Northern Ireland Court of Appeal would conclude Mr McDevitt’s conviction was unsafe.

Mr McDevitt (61) was convicted on December 12, 1986, by Mr Justice MacDermott sitting without a jury on one count of murder, two counts of wounding with intent, one count of attempting to cause grievous bodily harm and one count of possession of firearms with intent.

He challenged the prosecution evidence at trial, giving evidence in his own defence during a voir dire [a hearing to determine the admissibility of evidence] on the admissibility of a statement of admission.

Mr McDevitt asserted in his trial evidence that this evidence had been obtained by police [the RUC] using coercive and oppressive interview techniques.

He was convicted by the Diplock Court and received a sentence of life imprisonment. He served over 11 years in jail and was released subject to life licence.

Life licence means Mr McDevitt could be returned to jail again if he was ever deemed a risk to public safety, at the say so of the British Secretary of State.

Harte Coyle Collins Solicitors & Advocates applied to the CCRC on behalf of Mr McDevitt in 2002.

That application was refused in 2006, despite the finding of some significant new evidence, and Mr McDevitt continued his campaign to clear his name.

Mr McDevitt’s legal team made a second application to the CCRC on his behalf in 2019, on the basis of further new evidence obtained from public domain sources.

In making the referral, the CCRC relied on the discrediting of some of the interviewing police officers arising from the successful appeals of some of the UDR4 in 1992.

Further submissions by Harte Coyle Collins to the CCRC in 2025 resulted in the referral of another four convictions back to the Court of Appeal in April 2025. The evidence underpinning the further four convictions emanated from the same statement of admission.

Patricia Coyle said:

“Our client welcomes the opportunity to have the evidence underpinning these five convictions scrutinised and examined by the NI Court of Appeal.

“The focus in the appeal will be on the reliability of one statement of admission, which our client has asserted for 42 years and continues to assert was obtained using oppressive and coercive police interview techniques.