Thug's brother questioned over sectarian attack

Detectives were tonight questioning the brother of a sectarian thug who was jailed for attempting to kill and cut up his battered Catholic victim.

Aaron White, 33, was arrested by police hunting gang members who strangled and repeatedly stabbed Michael Reid during a merciless attack in Ballymena, Co Antrim.

His brother Neil, 30, has already been jailed for 16 years after pleading guilty to attempted murder.

Sentencing him at Belfast Crown Court last month, Mr Justice Coghlin hit out at the “corrosive toxin” of sectarianism eating into Northern Ireland’s social fabric.

He told the would-be killer: “Ultimately the victim went to ground and pretended he was dead.

“You were assigned to guard the victim while others left the premises with the chilling words: ’We are going to have to get a saw to cut him up, look at the size of him’.”

At one stage Mr Reid, 31, an imposing 6ft 4ins tall, went limp and pretended to be dead in a bid to survive the relentless assault two years ago.

The victim, who has since gone into hiding, was visiting a friend in Ballymena’s staunchly Protestant Harryville district when Neil White, of Wakehurst Road, Ballymena, and two other men came to the house.

Mr Reid was beaten with a blunt object, stabbed and throttled with cable after they discovered his religion.

Aaron White and another man went on the run after Neil White’s arrest.

But police today confirmed they had arrested a man on suspicion of involvement in the attempted sectarian murder.

A spokesman said: “The 33-year-old man was arrested in the Castle Street area of Ballymena shortly after noon today.”

Police sources confirmed the suspect being questioned was Aaron White.

Three men launched into Mr Reid after discovering he was a Catholic because of where he lived in the town.

While the other two went to get another weapon the victim made a dash for the door but was caught and stabbed again by Neil White.

After a struggle he managed to escape, running about 150 yards before collapsing on the road where a police patrol found him.

Doctors said he was lucky to be alive because he had lost so much blood.

Miraculously the knife had missed his vital organs.

Since the attack on October 11, 2003 Mr Reid has quit the town, which has been gripped by sectarian tensions, and claimed it was unsafe for Catholics to walk the streets in certain areas.

Passing sentence on Neil White, the judge added that a close relative with a greater intellect had influenced his actions.