Glenanne gang The Glenanne gang or Glenanne group was a secret informal alliance of Northern Irish loyalist extremists who carried out shooting and bombing attacks against the Irish Catholic and Irish nationalist community in the 1970s , during the Troubles . Most of its attacks took place in the area of County Armagh and mid - Ulster referred to as the " murder triangle " by journalist Joe Tiernan . It also launched some attacks elsewhere in Northern Ireland and in the Republic of Ireland . The gang included British soldiers from the Ulster Defence Regiment ( UDR ) , police officers from the Royal Ulster Constabulary ( RUC ) , and members of the Mid - Ulster Brigade of the illegal Ulster Volunteer Force ( UVF ) . Former members have alleged it was commanded by British Military Intelligence and RUC Special Branch . An independent inquiry , the 2006 " Cassel Report " , said that the group was responsible for at least 76 murders and there is evidence that British soldiers and RUC officers were involved in 74 of those . The Pat Finucane Centre has attributed 87 killings to the Glenanne gang . Attacks attributed to the group include the Dublin and Monaghan bombings , the Miami Showband killings , and the Reavey and O ' Dowd killings . Glenanne gang member and RUC officer John Weir affirmed the group ' s involvement in these and many other attacks . Weir claimed his superiors knew he was working with loyalist militants but allowed it to continue . The " Cassel Report " also said that some senior officers knew of the crimes but did nothing to prevent , investigate or punish . Weir ' s sworn ( 3 February 1999 ) affidavit was published in the 2003 " Barron Report " . These were the findings of an official investigation into the Dublin and Monaghan bombings , commissioned by Irish Supreme Court Justice Henry Barron . Weir was a member of the RUC ' s Special Patrol Group ( SPG ) , a specialised police unit tasked with counter - terrorism in Northern Ireland . The name " Glenanne gang " has been used since 2003 and is derived from the farm at Glenanne ( near Markethill , County Armagh ) that was used as the gang ' s arms dump and bomb - making site . Political situation in Northern Ireland . By the mid - 1970s the violent ethno - political conflict known as the Troubles had radically transformed the daily lives of people in Northern Ireland ; after five years of turbulent civil unrest , the bombings and shootings showed no signs of abating . The armed campaign waged by the IRA had escalated with bombings in England and increased attacks on the security forces in Northern Ireland . The British Army and the Royal Ulster Constabulary ( RUC ) in County Armagh bore the brunt of IRA violence and the local Protestants felt their community to be under attack . Rogue members of the RUC Special Patrol Group ( SPG ) believed that the situation was rapidly deteriorating and that the IRA were actually ' winning the war ' . As early as the end of 1973 , it was suggested that drastic measures had to be taken to defeat the organisation . The Special Patrol Group was a specialised police unit tasked with counter - terrorism in Northern Ireland . On 10 February 1975 , the Provisional IRA and British government entered into a truce and restarted negotiations . The IRA agreed to halt attacks on the British security forces , and the security forces mostly ended its raids and searches . However , there were dissenters on both sides . Some Provisionals wanted no part of the truce , while British commanders resented being told to stop their operations against the IRA just when — they claimed — they had the Provisionals on the run . There was a rise in sectarian killings during the truce , which ' officially ' lasted until February 1976 . Loyalists , fearing they were about to be forsaken by the British government and forced into a united Ireland , increased their attacks on the Irish Catholic and nationalist community . Loyalist fears were partially grounded in fact as MI6 officer Michael Oatley had engaged in negotiations with a member of the IRA Army Council during which " structures of disengagement " from Ireland were discussed . This had meant a possible withdrawal of British troops from Northern Ireland . Loyalists killed 120 Catholics in 1975 , the vast majority civilians . They hoped to force the IRA to retaliate and thus hasten an end to the truce . Formation of the Glenanne gang . It was during this exceptionally violent period that a group of loyalists extremists formed a loose alliance that was belatedly in 2003 given the name " Glenanne gang " . The gang , which contained over 40 known members , included soldiers of the British Army ' s Ulster Defence Regiment ( UDR ) , rogue elements of the RUC , the Mid - Ulster Brigade of the illegal paramilitary Ulster Volunteer Force ( UVF ) and some Ulster Defence Association ( UDA ) members . Former Glennane gang members have alleged it was commanded by British Military Intelligence and / or RUC Special Branch . This group began to carry out shooting and bombing attacks directed against the Irish Catholic and Irish nationalist population as a means of retaliation for the IRA ' s intensified military campaign . Most of these attacks took place in the area of County Armagh and Mid - Ulster referred to as the " murder triangle " by journalist Joe Tiernan . It also launched attacks elsewhere in Northern Ireland and in the Republic of Ireland . The name " Glenanne gang " is derived from the farm at Glenanne ( near Markethill , County Armagh ) that was used as the gang ' s arm dump and bomb - making site . Alleged members . The following people , among others , have been implicated by Justice Barron and Professor Douglass Cassel in their respective reports as having been members of the Glenanne gang : The gang has also been linked to Military Intelligence Liaison officer Captain Robert Nairac who worked for 14th Intelligence Company ( The Det ) . On " The Hidden Hand " programme made by Yorkshire Television in 1993 , it was claimed that Robin Jackson was controlled by Nairac and 14th Intelligence . In May 1977 , Nairac was kidnapped by the IRA in Dromintee and taken across the border into the Republic of Ireland where he was shot dead by Liam Townson in Ravensdale Woods , County Louth . Other members . Merlyn Rees , Secretary of State for Northern Ireland , lifted the proscription against the UVF on 4 April 1974 , but it was made illegal once again on 3 October 1975 ; therefore , during the period between April 1974 and October 1975 , membership of the UVF was not a crime . The largest loyalist paramilitary group in Northern Ireland , the Ulster Defence Association ( UDA ) was also legal . Attacks attributed to the Glenanne gang . In 2004 , the Pat Finucane Centre asked Professor Douglas Cassel ( formerly of Northwestern University School of Law in Chicago ) to convene an international inquiry to investigate alleged collusion by members of the British security forces in sectarian killings in Northern Ireland committed during the mid - 1970s . The Glenanne gang ' s involvement in the killings was to be investigated in particular . The panel interviewed victims and their relatives , as well as four members of the security forces . About 25 attacks are believed by the Pat Finucane Centre to have been the work of the Glenanne gang . The four members of the security forces were : RUC SPG officers John Weir and Billy McCaughey ; psychological warfare operative Colin Wallace and MI6 operative Captain Fred Holroyd . They all implicated the Glenanne gang in the attacks . In seven out of eight cases , ballistic tests corroborated Weir ' s claims linking the killings to weapons carried by the security forces . The interviews revealed many similarities in the way the attacks were carried out , while various documents ( including the " Barron Report " ) established a chain of ballistic history linking weapons and killings to the gang . Justice Barron commented in reference to the Glenanne gang : " This joining of RUC and UDR members with members of Loyalist paramilitary organisations is emphasised by the use of the same or connected guns by intermingled groups of these organisations . " As a result , the Pat Finucane Centre has linked the following attacks to the Glenanne gang : 1972 and 1973 1974 1975 1976 1977 onward The Glenanne farm and the Dublin and Monaghan bombings . It is claimed in the " Barron Report " that Billy Hanna had asked James Mitchell for permission to use his farm as a UVF arms dump and bomb - making site . Information that Loyalist paramilitaries were regularly meeting at the farm appeared on Army Intelligence documents from late 1972 . According to submissions received by Mr Justice Barron , the Glenanne farm was used to build and store the bombs that exploded in Dublin and Monaghan . The report claims they were placed onto Robin Jackson ' s poultry lorry , driven across the border to a carpark , then activated by Hanna and transferred to three allocated cars . These cars exploded almost simultaneously in Dublin ' s city centre at about 5 . 30pm during evening rush hour , killing 26 civilians . Ninety minutes later a fourth car bomb exploded in Monaghan , killing another seven civilians . Mitchell and his female housekeeper , Lily Shields both denied knowledge that the farm was used for illicit paramilitary activity . They also denied partaking in any UVF attacks . In his sworn affidavit , John Weir affirms that the farmhouse was used as a base for UVF operations that included the Dublin and Monaghan bombings . Weir also stated that on one occasion an RUC constable gave him two weapons to store at the Glenanne farm : " He then offered me the two sub - machine guns because he knew about my connection to Loyalist paramilitaries . I accepted them and took them to Mitchell ' s farmhouse " . In his affidavit , Weir recounted when in March 1976 he had gone to the farm where between eight to ten men dressed in camouflage had been parading in the farmyard . Inside he had discussed with Mitchell and others the details of a planned bombing and shooting attack against a nationalist pub , Tully ' s in Belleeks . Mitchell had shown him the floor plans of the pub ' s interior which he had drawn up highlighting the lack of escape routes for the pub ' s patrons . The plan was temporarily called off when it was discovered that the Army ' s Parachute Regiment was on patrol that evening in the area . Weir returned to Belfast the next day and the attack went ahead that evening , 8 March . There were no casualties , however , as Mitchell ' s floor plans had been inaccurate , and the customers had fled into the pub ' s living quarters for safety once the shooting had commenced outside , and the bomb only caused structural damage to the building . Mr . Justice Barron concluded in his report : " It is likely that the farm of James Mitchell at Glenanne played a significant part in the preparation for the attacks [ Dublin and Monaghan bombings ] . It is also likely that members of the UDR and RUC either participated in , or were aware of those preparations . " Miami Showband massacre . On 31 July 1975 , four days after Hanna ' s shooting and Jackson ' s assumption of leadership of the Mid - Ulster brigade , the Miami Showband ' s minibus was flagged - down outside Newry by armed UVF men wearing British Army uniforms at a bogus military checkpoint . Two UVF men ( Harris Boyle and Wesley Somerville ) loaded a time delay bomb on the minibus but it exploded prematurely and killed them . The remaining UVF gunmen then opened fire on the bandmembers , killing three ( Brian McCoy , Anthony Geraghty and Fran O ' Toole ) and wounding two ( Stephen Travers and Des McAlea ) . Two of the three men convicted of the killings and sentenced to life imprisonment were serving members of the UDR , and the third was a former member . The Luger pistol used in the attack was found to have been the same one used to kill Provisional IRA member John Francis Green in January 1975 and was also used in the O ' Dowd killings of January 1976 . The following May , the security forces found Jackson ' s fingerprints on a home - made silencer attached to a Luger . Although charged , Jackson avoided conviction . A Sterling 9mm submachine gun was also used in the Miami Showband killings . The 2003 Barron Report suggests that the guns were taken from the stockpile of weapons at the Glenanne farm . The Luger pistol used in the Green , Miami Showband , and O ' Dowd attacks was later destroyed by the RUC on 28 August 1978 . Liaison officer Captain Robert Nairac has been linked to the Miami Showband killings and the killing of John Francis Green . Miami Showband survivors Stephen Travers and Des McAlea both testified in court that a man with a " crisp , clipped English accent , and wearing a different uniform and beret " had been at the scene of the explosion and subsequent shootings . Martin Dillon in " The Dirty War " , however , adamantly states that Nairac was not involved in either attack . The Cassel Report concluded that there was " credible evidence that the principal perpetrator [ of the Miami Showband attack ] was a man who was not prosecuted – alleged RUC Special Branch agent Robin Jackson " . Although Jackson had been questioned by the RUC following the Showband attack , he was released without having been charged . Reavey and O ' Dowd killings and the Kingsmill massacre . The co - ordinated sectarian shootings of the Reavey and O ' Dowd families , allegedly perpetrated by the Glenanne gang and organised by Robin Jackson , provoked the South Armagh Republican Action Force to retaliate with a tit - fot - tat sectarian attack the following day . It stopped a minibus at Kingsmill and shot dead the ten Protestant passengers , after being taken out of their minibus which was transporting them home from their workplace in Glenanne . In 2001 an unidentified Glenanne gang - member ( a former RUC man who had been sentenced to life imprisonment for his part in the gang ' s killings ) revealed that the gang had planned to kill at least thirty Catholic schoolchildren as revenge for Kingsmill . It drew up plans to attack St Lawrence O ' Toole Primary School in the South Armagh village of Belleeks . The plan was aborted at the last minute on orders of the UVF leadership ; who ruled that it would be " morally unacceptable " , would undermine support for the UVF , and could lead to civil war . The gang - member who suggested the attack was a UDR soldier ; he was later shot dead by the IRA . The UVF leadership allegedly suspected that he was working for Military Intelligence , and that military intelligence were seeking to provoke a civil war . In 2004 , gang - member McCaughey spoke of the planned retaliation and said that the UVF leadership also feared the potential IRA response . Convictions . The " Cassel Report " states that convictions were obtained in only nine of the 25 cases it investigated and that several of those convictions are suspect as erroneous and incomplete . A month before Nairac ' s killing , a Catholic chemist , William Strathearn , was gunned down at his home in Ahoghill , County Antrim . SPG officers Weir and McCaughey were charged and convicted for the killing . Weir named Jackson as having been the gunman but Jackson was never interrogated for " reasons of operational strategy " . The Special Patrol Group was disbanded in 1980 by the RUC after the convictions of Weir and McCaughey for the Strathearn killing . In December 1978 the authorities raided the Glenanne farm and found weapons and ammunition . This made it necessary for the gang to seek an alternative base of operations and arms dump . James Mitchell was charged and convicted of storing weapons on his land . Northern Ireland ' s Lord Chief Justice Robert Lowry presided over his trial on 30 June 1980 . The farm had been under RUC observation for several months before the raid . On 16 October 1979 , Robin Jackson was arrested when he was found with a number of weapons and hoods . In January 1981 he was sentenced to seven years imprisonment for possession of guns and ammunition , but was then released in May 1983 . John Weir stated that the Glenanne gang usually did not use the name " UVF " whenever it claimed its attacks ; instead it typically employed the cover names of Red Hand Commando , Red Hand Brigade or Protestant Action Force .