Queen v Michael Stone
| Jurisdiction | Northern Ireland |
| Judge | Deeny J |
| Judgment Date | 14 November 2008 |
| Neutral Citation | [2008] NICC 36 |
| Court | Crown Court (Northern Ireland) |
| Date | 14 November 2008 |
1
Neutral Citation No. [2008] NICC 36 Ref:
DEE7176
Judgment: approved by the Court for handing down Delivered:
14/11/08
(subject to editorial corrections)*
IN THE CROWN COURT SITTING AT BELFAST
________
THE QUEEN
-v-
MICHAEL STONE
________
DEENY J
[1] The accused in this trial comes before the court on an indictment
preferring fourteen counts against him. The first count is of attempted
murder of Gerard Adams on 24 November 2006. The second count is one of
attempted murder of Martin McGuinness on the same date. The twelve other
counts all relate to the same events at Parliament Buildings, Stormont on that
day.
[2] The date of 24 November 2006 was of significance in the ongoing
process leading to agreed devolution of Government in Northern Ireland. It
had been fixed by Parliament as the day on which the Northern Ireland
Assembly would be prorogued unless the First and Deputy First Ministers
were nominated by the parties in accordance with the legislative
requirements. It was anticipated that the Reverend Ian Paisley would be
nominated on that day as First Minister and Mr Martin McGuinness as
Deputy First Minister.
[3] There was no dispute that the defendant was strongly opposed to these
developments and I will turn in due course to some of his hostile remarks
about this sharing of power between Dr Paisley and the leadership of Sinn
Fein. The issue at the trial was whether the Crown had proven beyond
reasonable doubt that the accused had the intent to murder the two Sinn Fein
leaders and the necessary intent to justify some or all of the other counts or
whether as he contended, through his then counsel Mr Arthur Harvey QC
who appeared with Mr Charles McCreanor, that his actions on that day
merely constituted performance art and that he had no such criminal
intentions. I sit as the tribunal of fact in this matter pursuant to the provisions
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of the Justice and Security (NI) Act 2007 and the Certificate of Sir Alasdair
Fraser CB QC of 10 December 2007. Mr Charles Adair QC led Mr Gary
McCrudden for the prosecution.
[4] On the morning of 24 November 2006 at about 9 a.m. Mr Daniel
Heggan, a taxi driver, went to his depot at the junction of Newtownards Road
and Ribble Street, Belfast. He there collected a fare, whom we now know to
be the defendant. Although the driver had been told the fare was for the
Stormont Hotel the defendant told him to drive to Stormont entrance gates.
[5] Mr Hagan noted that he walked very slowly with a limp and was
moving from side to side. He wore a hunting type hat and a scarf round his
face, a jacket and carried two bags, a tripod and a walking stick. He got into
the front passenger seat of the car, the door of which the driver opened for
him, with some difficulty. As he went up the Newtownards Road he asked
the driver to post two letters for him. One of those was addressed to Lindy
McDowell at the Belfast Telegraph and the other to a newspaper in England.
Mr Heggan thought he was a photographer and asked who he worked for.
He replied “I work for myself”. He asked the driver to stop just before the
entrance of the gates of Stormont and got out with all his baggage. He gave
the driver £20 although the fare was only £4.50 which helped fix him in the
driver’s memory when he saw subsequent media coverage of events.
[6] Alexander Hoy worked for Federal Security Services of Lisburn who
were responsible for security at various venues in Northern Ireland. On 24
November he was detailed to Stormont and arrived at about 8 a.m. There
was a briefing for him and other FSS staff. He was with Thomas Stitt and
they were assigned to patrol the perimeter of Parliament Buildings. He
returned from a tea break at 11 a.m. and let his companion go. He made his
way from the back of the building to the front and it was only two minutes
after eleven when he saw a man writing graffiti on the second pillar of the
portico at the front of Stormont. The man was dressed head to toe in dark
clothes and did not notice Mr Hoy approach. Mr Hoy asked him what he was
doing and he turned towards Mr Hoy, he reached into the left hand side of
his jacket with his left hand, because he had a spray can in his right hand and
he produced a handgun and pointed it at Mr Hoy’s face so that it was only 2
feet from him. He recognised him as Michael Stone. Stone said “You had
better run or you are a f---g dead man”. Mr Hoy was indeed going to run to
the east side of the building but Stone told him to go down the steps. As Mr
Hoy very properly wanted to raise the alarm he persisted in heading towards
the east of the building where he knew there would be security personnel. He
ran in a zig zag fashion because he was very worried that Stone might open
fire and felt in danger of his life. When he got to the east entrance to
Parliament Buildings it took him a few moments to persuade his colleagues
that he really had seen Michael Stone with a gun and that they should raise
the alarm. In cross-examination he said that Stone looked unsteady on his
3
feet. When he saw him a little after the initial confrontation he was being held
by other security personnel and was shouting obscenities although he
described Mr Hoy to his face as “a brave soldier”. Counsel put to him that he
had interrupted Mr Stone in spraying graffiti and that he had not finished.
The witness said that was correct.
[7] On 21 May the court heard from Ms Sue Porter another employee of
Federal Security Services assigned to Stormont on 24 November. Following
the briefing she took up a role at the main front revolving door on the south
side of Parliament Buildings. There were a considerable number of visitors to
the building on this day in particular, including a party of secondary school
children with their teachers.
[8] At about 11 o’clock the witness noticed through the glass doors a
figure who looked frail and soaked to the skin on what was a wet day. She
went to help him in thinking he was a photographer but as he came through
the revolving doors and lifted his eyes to her she recognised him as Michael
Stone. She put her hand up to stop the door and sought to put her foot in the
door also and asked him what he was doing there. At first he rather timidly
said “Love” but then he pulled out a gun and held it to her face only inches
away. He told her to move back or he would f…..g shoot her. She took a step
back. She discovered a week later that she had broken a bone in her hand
which would indicate a degree of forcefulness on the part of Stone in pushing
the doors round to cause this injury to her. After threatening the doorkeeper
Stone threw a bag on the ground with a fuse coming out of. He produced a
green lighter and succeeded in lighting the fuse which sparkled. He seems to
then have kicked the bag away. The witnesses recollection was that she then
struggled with him and the gun but I will return to this in the evidence of the
next witness. The accused was shouting remarks about Sinn Fein and Paisley
as this went on. The witness when she grappled with Stone felt that he was
very hard around the stomach and she thought he was a human bomb. Her
colleague Mr Peter Lachanudis came to her assistance. When she got hold of
the gun from his hand she realised from her experience from her previous
employment that it was not a real gun but an imitation firearm. He was still
struggling with her colleague and so she struck him with the gun and at some
point kneed him in the groin to try and restrain him in the circumstances.
These were acute as she asked him what was in the bag at one point and he
said “grenades and everything”. She said “You’re going to get hurt, blown up
too” but he said “so be it”. At another point he said to get out of there
because the bomb was going to go up. I consider the force used by the
security guards was entirely reasonable in the circumstances. Ms Porter and
her colleagues managed to wrestle him to the ground where she tied his
shoelaces together to prevent him moving away. He was taken out through
adjoining doors where flares and a knife were removed from him. He
continued to shout “No surrender” and make remarks about Sinn Fein and Dr
Paisley. After police arrived it emerged that under his zip up jacket he had on
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