Court refuses access to MI5 files in McKevitt case

The Special Criminal Court today rejected an application by lawyers representing the alleged leader of the Real IRA, Michael McKevitt, for access to secret unedited MI5 documents.

The five documents were flown into Ireland on Monday after Mr McKevitt's lawyers argued that they contained material that was very important to the defence. The court heard that edited versions of the documents had been disclosed to the defence but that in some cases, entire pages had been blacked out.