Former Bloody Sunday inquiry judge dies

The Bloody Sunday Inquiry was today informed of the death of one of its former judges.

As the inquiry resumed in Londonderry’s Guildhall today, lawyers were told that Sir Edward Summers, a former New Zealand Appeal Court judge who stepped down from the inquiry for ‘‘personal reasons’’ in August 2000, died earlier this month.

Speaking on behalf of the inquiry at the start of the proceedings, Sir Christopher Clarke QC said they had ‘‘learnt, with great regret, of the death earlier this month of Sir Edward Summers, a former member of the Tribunal’’.

In August 2000, Sir Edward announced he was standing down with the ‘‘greatest regret’’.

He was one of three judges originally appointed to serve in the inquiry alongside Lord Saville of Newdigate and Mr Justice William Hoyt.

In a letter to the then Northern Ireland Secretary Peter Mandelson, Sir Edward explained his decision to quit was reached ‘‘only after very considerable soul-searching’’.

‘‘I shall not be able to bring to the task the vigour and energy which it will undoubtedly require over the remaining two-to-three years of its life,’’ he explained.

Sir Edward was from Christchurch in New Zealand and was married with a son and two daughters.

He was appointed a judge of the Supreme Court of New Zealand in 1974.

In 1981, he was made a judge of New Zealand’s Appeal Court and a Privy Councillor in 1981.

He retired in 1990.