Northern Ireland

Photograph of David Murphy released

Police and forensic teams at the scene of the murder of David Murphy who was shot twice with a shotgun at his home in Glenwherry, Co Antrim. Picture Mal McCann.
Police and forensic teams at the scene of the murder of David Murphy who was shot twice with a shotgun at his home in Glenwherry, Co Antrim. Picture Mal McCann. Police and forensic teams at the scene of the murder of David Murphy who was shot twice with a shotgun at his home in Glenwherry, Co Antrim. Picture Mal McCann.

DETECTIVES have released a photograph of murdered loyalist David Murphy whose body was found with shotgun wounds at his Co Antrim farmhouse.

On Wednesday night police confirmed they are investigating whether an assault on the 52-year-old well known loyalist at his home is linked to the fatal shooting.

A neighbour found Murphy's body on Tuesday afternoon, although he may have been murdered the previous evening.

He had been blasted twice with a shotgun in an attack detectives described as "brutal".

Sources say Murphy was attacked by a three-man gang some time over the weekend at his home on Church Road in Glenwherry, on the outskirts of Ballymena.

Police said they were aware of reports of an earlier assault on the murdered man and this was "something they are looking at as part of part the inquiry".

Murphy, described in court as a ‘sheep farmer’, had loyalist paramilitary links. In 2004 he was charged with possession of a large haul of weapons belonging to the UVF, including a sub machine gun and four pistols.