European Court Dismisses Real IRA Appeal to Overturn Ruling in Omagh Bombing Case (September 29, 2016) [1]
On September 29, 2016, the European Court of Human Rights dismissed [3] an appeal in McKevitt and Campbell v. the United Kingdom, which was based on the infamous 1998 Omagh Bombing that killed 29 people in Omagh, Northern Ireland, in what has been called the single worst atrocity of the Troubles. According to the press release [4], the defendants argued that the first instance court should have applied a criminal, rather than civil, standard of proof against them due to the severity of the claims. Additionally, they claimed that the admission of testimony by a U.S. FBI agent was unfair as the witness was not available for questioning. There has never been a criminal prosecution for the case, though the civil prosecution brought by the families of the victims at the center of the appeal was successful. The Court dismissed the claim regarding the standard of proof “because the proceedings had been for a civil claim for damages; there had been no criminal charge.” As for the fairness of admitting the FBI agent’s testimony, the Court ruled that “the defendants had had an adequate opportunity to challenge the agent’s evidence with their own” and that the judge had adequately assessed the weight that should have been attached to the evidence. Based on these determinations, the Court ruled that “the national court’s findings could not be said to have been unfair arbitrary or unreasonable” and subsequently dismissed the application.