State papers 1987: Loughgall guns linked to 50 murders

An IRA group which was killed during an ambush by the SAS in the Co Armagh village of Loughgall in 1987 was responsible for up to 50 murders, secret government documents have revealed.

The eight provisional IRA, (PIRA), members shot dead by the SAS on May 8, 1987, at Loughgall Police Station in Co Armagh. Top row, from left: Jim Lynagh; Eugene Kelly; Patrick Kelly; Gerard O’Callaghan. Bottom row, from left: Padraig McKearney; Seamus Donnelly; Tony Gormley; Declan Arthurs.

State papers released under the 30-year rule, show that ballistic tests on weapons used by the eight-man IRA unit during the attempted bombing of the RUC station in Loughgall on May 8, 1987, linked them to every single murder and attempted murder in Tyrone and Fermanagh that year.