THE daughter of a UVF murder victim, later sent a threatening letter by his killer, is set to challenge a decision not to revoke his early release licence.
Solicitors acting for Denise Mullen launched legal action after the Multi-Agency Risk Assessment Panel (MARAP) said it had decided not to revoke the licence of convicted UVF killer Garfield Beattie.
Beattie served 16 years in jail for three sectarian including that of Ms Mullen's father Denis in September 1975.
In December Beattie was sentenced to 17 months after he sent Ms Mullen a threatening letter signed 'East Tyrone UVF'.
Ms Mullen, who is deputy leader of Aontú, had wanted Beattie's early release licence to be revoked.
However, in a letter to her solicitor Gavin Booth, of Phoenix Law, last week a Departmental Solicitor's Office official said the "threshold for initiation of revocation proceedings has not been met".
The official said Beattie's case had been "subject to considerable scrutiny" and that "risk, management and compliance with his licence conditions will be kept under review going forward and any appropriate steps taken where necessary".
Ms Mullen is now set to challenge a decision to turn down her request to attend the Beattie review in order to make submissions and a refusal to provide minutes from previous meetings relating to Beattie's licence conditions.
"I am very annoyed that after all that he has put me and my family through that his licence has not been revoked," she said last night.
Mr Booth said the decision by the Multi-Agency Review Arrangements (MARA) was "concerning" alleging failures on their part in allowing them to make represenations on the matter.
"It's quiet concerning that our request to make representations and to attend the hearing was firstly ignored secondly that the panel of representatives from state bodies, including DoJ, PSNI and other unknowns failed to take into account the views of a victim and her legal representatives.
"(They) also failed to allow us the opportunity to set out how this may have affected her since the murder of her father in the 1970s and then again through the threatening letters purporting to be from the UVF."
Responding to the claims a Department for Justice spokesperson said: “As legal proceedings are on-going, it would be inappropriate to comment.”
