Boston College Tapes Controversy

Introduction

The Boston College Tapes can
be seen as one of the most controversial topics surrounding the troubles in
Northern Ireland to date. In 2001, the Boston College of Massachusetts set
about creating an oral history of the troubles to give people of the future
first-hand information on what life was like for people at the time. Ex paramilitary
members from Republican and Unionist backgrounds were approached and asked to
take part in this creation of oral history. Ed Moloney, a writer and journalist
was the director of the project. Republicans were interviewed by an ex IRA
prisoner Dr Anthony McIntyre and Loyalists were recorded by Wilson McArthur.[1]
The project had one crucial rule, that rule was none of the information spoken
about in the interviews could be used or released only with permission of the
interviewee or when they died.1 Out of
coincidence, the first two interviewees to pass away were arguably two of the
most iconic figures who had lived through the troubles. These men were David
Ervine, a former Irish Republican Army (IRA) commander and David Ervine, a
member of the Ulster Volunteer Force (UVF).¹ David was interviewed
between May and October 2004 while Brendan Hughes was interviewed between March
2001 and August 2002. 1 Both men gave
their own accounts of several major events that took place during the troubles.
Many of the significant moments spoken about overlapped with both interviewees
but the opinions on the cause of these key events contrasted greatly.¹
When both men had died and the tapes were released, some of the topics spoken
about during the interviews angered the public, particularly the Police Service
of Northern Ireland (PSNI). They felt that if these two interviews contained both
men confessing being part of illegal paramilitary organisations, then the rest
of the interviews must contain valuable information in solving many of the cold
case murders that took place in the North at the time. A legal war was about to
take place leaving the whole argument about ethics and what is right and wrong
up for serious debate.

The
day lives were changed

On Friday the 21 July 1972,
the IRA detonated 26 bombs across the city of Belfast in under two hours.
Extreme casualties were recorded with nine people dying and 130 injured.[2] On
Oxford street bus station, a car bomb exploded killing four workers and two
soldiers. In Cavehill Road in the north of the city, two women and a schoolboy
were killed by another car bomb.2 “Some
of the bodies were so badly mutilated that it was initially thought that a
greater number of people had died”.2 Even
though warning calls were given by the IRA, the police and emergency services
of the city were unable to cope with such large-scale damage from bombs
detonating. This faithful day later came to be called ‘Bloody Friday’.2 During the recordings, both men admitted
that this was a significant moment in the course of their involvement in
paramilitary acts. Hughes says that “ I was one of the key monoverse on the day
later to be known as Bloody Friday”[3] In
the tapes, Ervine admits that after witnessing ‘Bloody Friday’ he says he “I went
over the edge, the following Sunday I joined the UVF. I wanted to sort of hit
back and I wanted to hit back with an absolute ruthlessness.”³ From
that day forward, the men’s lives would never be the same as both became key
figures in their separate paramilitary groups.

The
Legal Dispute

Following the release of the
tapes, tensions began to mount between the PSNI and the Boston College. In
March 2011, the British Government announced to the US Department of Justice
that they would be initiating a Mutual Legal Assistance Treaty (MLAT). The
British Government wanted this agreement because they wanted to issue a
subpoena for all data involving Brendan Hughes and Dolours Price. [4]
Because of the agreement that no data could be released to the public until
that interviewee had died, the British Government had no access to the tapes.
After the British attempted to initiate a (MLAT), Boston filed a motion to
quash this attempted subpoena in June.4
The British Government were not long about submitting a second subpoena and did
so in August. This time, they wanted all material of Dolours Prices interviews
containing information on the disappearance of Jean McConville, a young girl
who was kidnapped and murdered by the IRA in 1972. After this second subpoena,
Ed Moloney and Anthoney McIntyre, key figures in the creation of the tapes
wanted to take action on their own material in the Boston Tapes and show
support for the Boston College in attempts to quash the motion of the British
Government. 4 If the quash of the
motion was successful, they would be allowed to join the action as plaintiffs looking
to force the Attorney General to stand by his rules under the US-UK (MLAT).⁴
The men wanted the court to summon the Attorney General to use the precise
knowledge of the clear promises made by the U.K. Government to the U.S. Senate
that it would not revive topics addressed in the Belfast Agreement or cause any
damage to the painstaking efforts made and established in Northern Ireland.⁴
 In December 2011, The Motion to
Quash the Subpoenas by the Boston College and Moloney and McIntyre attempt to
intervene was ruled against by Judge William G. Young. He effectively summoned
the Boston College to review the material and hand over the tapes. After this
result, Boston College were prepared to abide with the result while McIntyre
and Moloney filed a Notice of Appeal. With this, they also succeeded in
claiming a Motion For Stay Pending Appeal to the First Circuit.⁴ Unfortunately
for Moloney and McIntyre, Judge Young dismissed their complaints in January
2012. ⁴

On 4 April 2012, Moloney and
McIntyre’s appeal was heard at the First Circuit Court of Appeal in which they
put forward in Febuary of 2012. ⁴ A stay from the US Supreme Court
was granted to McIntyree and Moloney which led to the formation of a cert
petition. Their Petition for a Writ of Certiorari was filed in mid-November
2012.⁴ Originally, the Solicitor General refrained the US Government
right to appeal. Several groups such as Freedom of Press, Irish American
Coalition of the AOH and many more filed Amicus Briefs to show their support of
the petitioners. After these groups filed the Amicus Briefs, the Solicitor
General requested and was granted an extension to file a response which had to
be submitted by 31 January 2013.⁴

On 15 April 2013, Moloney and
McIntyres’ petition was denied by the Supreme Court. By the end of May 2013, Boston
Colleges petition and motions were dismissed by the First Circuit Court of
Appeals.⁴ This ruling was a huge outcome of the controversy as the
decision reduced the volume of material to be given over from around 85
interviews to sections of 11 interviews. Once more in August 2013, the US
Attorney submitted a request for a rehearing of the decision which Boston
College opposed. Like many of the decisions of the controversy, their request
was denied.⁴

After all the subpoena
requests, the legal battle entering the doors of the Supreme Court of the
United States and the appeal which led to the amount of data being released to
the British Government greatly reduced, on 13 September 2013, the First Circuit
Court Appeal began to discuss its official order of it’s ruling from 31 May
2013. ⁴

Unfortunately on 23 of  January 2013, Dolours Price died in her home
in Dublin. As part of the MLAT agreement, her tapes were now available to the
British Government to gain access to.⁴ In her interview, a large
proportion of the material was around on the kidnapping and killing of Jean
McConville. The PSNI felt with the evidence obtained in these tapes they could
arrest the supposed people involved and solve the case. In 2014, the PSNI
arrested many people including Gerry Adams and Ivor Bells and Gerry Adams.
Fortunately for Gerry Adams, he was released without charge while Ivor Bells
case is still in proceedings. ⁴

A number of people were
arrested in 2014 in relation to the McConville case and Boston College tapes,
including Ivor Bell and Gerry Adams. Adams was released without charge while
Bell’s case is still ongoing.⁴ In 2015 the PSNI sought and were
granted access to loyalist Winston Rea’s archive material. His case is still
ongoing. In 2016, a subpoena was issued to Boston College seeking access to the
archive material of lead researcher Anthony McIntyre. His case is still before
the courts. 4

The controversy of the tapes
is still very much a reality today. On 6 November 2018, Anthony McIntyre
planned to appeal against the PSNI having access to his tapes in the European
Human Rights Court. [5]
Only a month ago McIntyre lost a legal bid to have the information of his tapes
kept confidential. ⁵  The PSNI
want to gain access to McIntyre’s tapes because of his involvement in the IRA
and the several bombings that he may have been involved in stretching back as
far as the 1970s. ⁵  McIntyre
felt that the police shouldn’t be allowed to access his tapes due to a fault in
the International Letter of Request (ILOR). ⁵ There is no official
decision made yet but the case is assured to rumble on for who knows how long.

In conclusion there are many
lessons to be learned from the Boston College Tapes. It really depends on what
way an individual may look at the project overall. From one perspective, the
project can be seen as a great pool of primary sources. A group of ex
paramilitary members from Catholic and Protestant backgrounds giving their side
of the story to how they were involved and how they coped during the war. On
this level, we can see how valuable the primary source can be. From another
perspective, particularly a legal one, the Boston College Tapes is a source of
data that has the potential to solve a lot of cases of killings and kidnappings
that took place at the time. The Jean McConville case, in particular, is spoken
about very often in the tapes and the PSNI feel with access to the data, the
case would be solved once and for all. In argument to this however, the rights
of the interviewees must be kept as they all officially agreed that their tapes
wouldn’t be released until after their deaths. The Boston Project will most
definitely be widely contested on the legal front for many years to come.

Bibliography

Primary Sources

• Kate O’Calaghan Documentary, Voices from the Grave, based on book Voices from the Grave by Ed Moloney, recorded 2001, accessed on the 28 November 2018.

Secondary Sources

• Alan Erwin, ‘McIntyre plans appeal in European human rights court’ Irish Times, (2018), accessed 3 December 2018, URL https://www.irishtimes.com/news/crime-and-law/boston-tapes-mcintyre-plans-appeal-in-european-human-rights-court-1.3688117
• Ed Moloney, Voices From the Grave, (London 2010), p.6-8
• Gordon Gillespie A Short History of The Troubles, (Reading 2010), p. 35-40
• Boston College Subpoena News; Legal Timeline, (2011), Accessed 28 Nov. 18, https://bostoncollegesubpoena.wordpress.com/

[1] Ed Moloney,
Voices From the Grave, (London 2010),
p.6-8

[2] Gordon Gillespie A Short
History of The Troubles, (Reading 2010), p. 30-40

[3]  Kate O’Calaghan Documentary, Voices from the Grave, based on book Voices from the Grave by Ed Moloney,
recorded 2001, accessed on the 28 November 2018

[4] Boston College Subpoena News; Legal Timeline, (2011), Accessed 28 Nov. 18, https://bostoncollegesubpoena.wordpress.com/

[5] Alan Erwin, ‘McIntyre plans appeal in European human rights court’ Irish Times, (2018), accessed 3 December 2018, URL https://www.irishtimes.com/news/crime-and-law/boston-tapes-mcintyre-plans-appeal-in-european-human-rights-court-1.3688117