Charlie McMenamin successfully challenges RUC injustice!

Derry Republican and contibutor to Ógra Shinn Féin publication 'Awaiting The Lark', Charlie McMenamin has walked free from court 27 years after he was wrongly convicted.

Charlie was only 16 when he was convicted of 'terrorist offences' in Derry and was in custody for three years. But his case was referred to the Court of Appeal by the Criminal Cases Review Commission, the body set up to investigate possible miscarriages of justice.

And yesterday Lord Justice Campbell said he and two fellow judges had a sense of unease about the convictions and upheld the appeal.

Outside the court Charlie, now aged 45, who lives in the Creggan area of Derry, said he was delighted not only for himself but also for his mother who had believed in his innocence all along.

He said:

"Down the years my mother encouraged me to keep trying to clear my name and now it`s been done."

Mr McMenamin`s wife Catherine was in court to hear the three judges quash his convictions.

During the hearing it was revealed that on the day the then schoolboy was alleged to have been involved in a gun attack on British Soldiers in the Bogside he was in a training school.

That information led to an official in the office of the Director of Public Prosecutions telling the RUC that the charges were not to be proceeded with. But the court heard the direction was never communicated to the prosecuting lawyer and the teenager was `convicted on statements of admission he made to avoid more ill-treatment while in Strand Road police station`.

Charlie's comrades in Ógra are delighted with the result yesterday - highlighting again the injustices and inequalities of the British System need to be challenged and overturned!