Old Bailey bomber and Adams accuser Price dies

Dolours Price, who was jailed for the IRA bombing of London’s Old Bailey in 1973, has died.

The 62-year-old, who had two children with former husband, the actor Stephen Rae, was found at her home in Malahide, north Dublin.

The Old Bailey bombing left one man dead and more than 200 people injured.

Price became a vocal opponent of the peace process and made a series of serious public allegations regarding Sinn Féin’s Gerry Adams in recent years.

Gardaí say the death is not being treated as suspicious.

Price had been outspoken about Mr Adams’s alleged involvement with the IRA for several years. She and her 58-year-old sister Marian, who has been in prison in the North since 2011 after her licence was revoked, were critics of the peace process.

In 1973, the two sisters were part of the IRA unit that planted four car bombs outside the Old Bailey. Two of the bombs exploded.

Dolours Price, sentenced to life for the bombing, accused Mr Adams of sanctioning the attack.

She also alleged he personally ordered the abduction of several people the IRA considered to be traitors in the 1970s, including Jean McConville, a Belfast mother of 10.

Mr Adams has always denied ever being a member of the IRA.

Price claimed she made the allegations on the record to researchers working for Boston College in the US, which the PSNI has been battling to recover as evidence.

The recordings were made on the basis that they remain secret until the death of the 28 former IRA and Ulster Volunteer Force terrorists who took part.

Price went on hunger strike with her sister after being charged over the Old Bailey bombing.

They refused food for 200 days and were subsequently repatriated to Northern Ireland to serve their sentences.

Mr Adams insisted he feels no bitterness towards his accuser.

“None whatsoever,” he said. “I’m sad and shocked to hear that she is dead, and I’m sure everybody who knew her or knew of her will also be sad at this time.”

The Sinn Féin leader took the opportunity to call for the release of her sister Marian from prison, adding that she should never have been jailed without a trial.

Her licence was revoked after she read a statement at a dissident republican Easter Rising commemoration in Derry in 2011.

Mr Adams, who said he had not spoken to Price for some time, said he had no concerns about her allegations against him being made public by Boston College: “I never worry about matters that I have no control over and I have no concerns about any of those issues because they are not true.”