Man cleared of Omagh bombing on drink driving charge

The man cleared of the Omagh bomb massacre appeared in court today charged with drink driving.

Sean Hoey, 39, had alcohol in excess of the legal limit in his system when he was stopped by police in his home village of Jonesborough, south Armagh, earlier this month, Newry Magistrates’ Court heard.

Standing in the dock dressed in a grey green jacket, a black jumper and blue jeans, he did not speak during his brief appearance, nodding only to acknowledge he understood the charge against him.

An officer with the Police Service of Northern Ireland told Magistrate Paul Copeland that he could connect Hoey, from Molly Road, Jonesborough, with the offence on the nearby Finegans Road on July 5.

Mr Copeland ordered the electrician, who was fuller in face than during the marathon Omagh trial of two years ago, to appear before him again next month for a further hearing.

In December 2007, Hoey was acquitted in Belfast Crown Court of murdering the 29 people who died in the August 1998 Real IRA outrage.

He was also cleared of 26 other charges linked to a series of dissident republican attacks in the months around Omagh.

In his judgment, Mr Justice Weir strongly criticised the case presented by the prosecution during the 56-day trial, accusing police of handling forensic evidence in a thoughtless and slapdash manner.

No one has ever been successfully criminally prosecuted for the atrocity, which came only four months after the signing of the North’s historic Good Friday Agreement peace settlement.

However, last month four men were found liable for the bombing in a landmark civil case taken by the families and ordered to pay millions in compensation.

Hoey was not among the respondents named in the families’ action, which was heard in Belfast High Court.

In the wake of the civil case and a Police Ombudsman’s investigation that cleared two scene-of-crime officers accused of lying during the criminal trial, the PSNI has decided to review all of its evidence relating to Omagh to see if there are grounds for any new criminal proceedings. After today’s hearing in Newry, Hoey left court alone.