Bid to overturn jailing of Adair fails

A BELFAST judge yesterday refused to overturn the prison sentence of Johnny “Mad Dog” Adair, Northern Ireland’s notorious Loyalist leader.

Adair’s lawyers had argued that the decision to jail him was unlawful because he had been denied a fair and public hearing of the charges levelled against him.

It was argued Adair had not been stopped, questioned, interviewed or arrested before being sent back to prison. However, Chief Justice Robert Carswell ruled that Britain acted lawfully and reasonably. He ordered Adair to serve the remainder of his 1995 conviction for “directing terrorism”, an unprecedented charge in Northern Ireland. Adair’s projected parole date is January 2005.

Adair, nicknamed “Mad Dog” because of his boasts that he was responsible for killing more than a dozen Catholic civilians, was one of more than 200 UDA convicts who received early paroles from prison under the terms of the Good Friday Agreement of 1998.

But Britain reserved the right to re-imprison anyone implicated in fresh violence.

Adair had already been sent back to prison once, from August 2000 to May 2002, for allegedly leading a deadly feud with a rival Loyalist gang, the Ulster Volunteer Force.

Adair stirred tensions almost from the moment of his parole last year, particularly within his own organisation.

As the top UDA figure in the Shankill district of west Belfast, Adair suggested he ought to become overall commander of the entire 3,000-member UDA, which traditionally has six self-styled “brigadiers” of equal rank.

However, other UDA commanders opposed his ambitions.

In September they accused Adair of siding with the Loyalist Volunteer Force in peddling drugs in east Belfast, the power base of UDA brigadier Jim Gray.

Three died in that UDA-LVF feud, during which Gray survived a gunshot to the head.

After Gray and the other four UDA commanders expelled Adair, renewed feuding broke out in December, between mainstream UDA members and Adair’s 120-strong Shankill unit.

Britain ordered Adair re-imprisoned after two men had been killed, one from each faction, but Adair allegedly continued to plan “hits” against his former colleagues.

The feud effectively ended on February 1 when Adair underlings ambushed and killed two UDA men, including UDA brigadier John Gregg, in a drive-by shooting. The UDA demanded that Adair’s unit either defect or face death.

More than 100 Shankill members rejected Adair’s authority while dozens more, including Adair's wife and children, were forced to flee to Scotland.