Northern Ireland’s Police Ombudsman has accepted a legal failure to fully investigate a complaint about the historic unsolved double murder of a husband and wife in front of their two young children.
The concession was made at the High Court on Friday in a successful challenge mounted by relatives of Mervyn and Rosaleen McDonald.
Lawyers for the victims’ family have now called on the watchdog body to examine new claims that a loyalist paramilitary confessed to the killings.
Mr and Mrs McDonald were shot dead at the family’s home in Newtownabbey, Co Antrim in July 1976.
The Catholic couple’s son Seamus and daughter Margaret, then aged two and six months, were present and witnessed their parents being killed.
No-one was ever prosecuted for the random sectarian attack.
In 2012 detectives from the now defunct Historical Enquiries Team (HET) carried out a review, but concluded they were unable to identify any investigative opportunities.
The following year Mrs McDonald’s sister, Marie McNally, complained to a watchdog body about the original RUC probe into the murders.
She issued judicial review proceedings against the Ombudsman over delays in dealing with her case since then.
The court also heard new evidence has emerged that the HET obtained a confession to the murder of her sister and brother-in-law.
It was claimed that an ex-HET employee informed her solicitors last year that a member of a loyalist paramilitary group made “admissions” to involvement in the killings during a meeting in 2009.
He allegedly told the victim’s children that he had passed this information onto the police who then warned him to “wind his neck in”.
When lawyers for Ms McNally alerted the Ombudsman to the alleged admission earlier this year, they were informed that the probe into the original complaint remains pending as part of a wider investigation into more than 50 murders attributed to the UDA or UFF.
The watchdog also cited inadequate funding from the Department of Justice.
However, it has emerged that the Ombudsman’s Office has now told the family it will no longer be able to look into the complaint because the government’s controversial Legacy Act imposes a cut-off date for conflict-related cases.
A letter sent to Seamus McDonald on the day before the challenge was heard expressed regret and stated: “The Police Ombudsman is compelled by the new legislation to cease all investigative work on legacy matters by the aforesaid date in May 2024".
Counsel for the body was unaware of the correspondence at the time of his original submissions.
In court on Friday he offered an unreserved apology to the family for how the situation unfolded.
“In light of the nature of the claim and the position the respondent finds itself in, the respondent concedes leave (to apply for judicial review) and consents to the declaratory relief,” the barrister confirmed.
Based on the new developments, Mr Justice Humphreys confirmed that Ms McNally had succeeded in her challenge and ordered the Ombudsman’s Office to pay her legal costs.
The judge declared: “The respondent has acted contrary to its obligations under the Police (Northern Ireland) Act 1998 in investigating the applicant’s complaint".
Outside court Ms McNally’s solicitor, Gary Duffy of KRW Law, said: “We welcome that the Police Ombudsman has conceded this challenge and accepted the failure to properly investigate the deaths of Rosaleen and Mervyn McDonald contrary to his legal obligations.
“On foot of the concession, we ask the Police Ombudsman to urgently investigate the PSNI's failure to act on the confession the HET received in 2009.”