The North's Police Ombudsman Nuala O'Loan has exonerated a police officer who shot dead a 21-year-old man in April 2003. Neil McConville from Bleary, Co Armagh, who was shot three times after a car chase, was the first person to be killed by the PSNI.
The ombudsman, however, was severely critical of background officers not directly involved in the shooting, complaining that sensitive intelligence was deleted from a PSNI computer and that a number of officers refused to co-operate with her investigators.
Overall Mrs O'Loan ruled that the operation that led to the death of Mr McConville was "poorly managed" by senior officers, but the "officer who fired the fatal shots was justified in using his firearm to protect the life of a colleague".
Mr McConville was shot three times as he attempted to drive away from police officers who had stopped his car following a pursuit along the Aghalee Road near Ballinderry, outside Lisburn.
The shots were fired when officers believed he was about to drive over a police officer who had been knocked down by his car and was lying injured directly in his path.
Mrs O'Loan said the police decision to pursue the car and stop it "from behind" was a high-risk strategy. She criticised senior officers for failing to properly consider alternative options.
As a result of her investigation Mrs O'Loan recommended that two officers be transferred to "less contentious areas of policing".
It also emerged from her investigation that the police officer only intended to fire one shot at Mr McConville "but his gun had inadvertently been set to 'three shot burst' mode". This was not the first time the ombudsman has come across such cases, she said. Accordingly, she also recommended that most PSNI weapons be adapted to remove their capacity to fire automatically.
Police had been acting on information that the car was to be used to collect a firearm to be used against another individual. An unloaded sawn-off shotgun was recovered from the vehicle.
A man in the car with Mr McConville was wounded in the incident. He was later jailed for four years for possession of the weapon.
It emerged yesterday that the PSNI Chief Constable Sir Hugh Orde had to intervene to ensure her investigators were afforded access to intelligence. However, when accessing this information they were told that a specific piece of intelligence "had been accidentally deleted from a police computer".
She also reported that of the five officers in the PSNI control room during the operation, three did not fully co-operate with her investigation.
