McKevitt jailed for 20 years

Dissident republican leader Michael McKevitt (aged 53) was sentenced to 20 years at Dublin's Special Criminal Court today for directing terrorism and membership of the Real IRA.

Real IRA leader Michael McKevitt was sentenced to 20 years imprisonment today for directing the organisation behind the Omagh bomb atrocity.

McKevitt (aged 53) was also given six years for membership of the splinter Republican paramilitary grouping, to run concurrently.

Mr Justice Richard Johnson delivered the sentence at Dublin’s Special Criminal Court where the Dundalk man had refused to leave his holding cell.

But McKevitt emerged after sentence was passed to declare: “I would like to appeal.”

The sentence handed down is to run from when McKevitt was first arrested in March 2001, the judges said.

His capture and conviction marked a shattering blow for the Real IRA as it tried to mount a new terror offensive in Northern Ireland and Britain.

It was also a major boost for relatives of the Omagh victims in their quest for justice against the men they blame for the worst single atrocity during 30 years of violence.

But unlike yesterday, when McKevitt was found guilty after a five-week trial, none of the families were in court today to hear Mr Justice Johnson stress the jail term should not be seen as a direct response to that massacre.

He said: “The offences are for periods outside the date of the Omagh bomb and the court must not allow itself to seek revenge for the victims of that atrocity and does not intend to do so.”

With the fifth anniversary of the explosion looming next week, no one has ever been convicted for Omagh.

But another hard-line republican, Colm Murphy is currently serving 14 years imprisonment on conspiracy to cause an explosion charges related to the bombing of the Co Tyrone town.

The judge also revealed that, with the Murphy sentence in mind, he and his colleagues had considered putting McKevitt behind bars for 25 years on the directing terrorism charge alone.

“This court feels the present case is more serious,” Mr Justice Johnson said.

“But the court must afford the accused the opportunity to rehabilitate and does so.”