"I am completely innocent. I had nothing to do with Castlereagh and I want my son back in my life," said Larry Zaitschek, speaking from his home in New York this weekend. He hasn't seen his five year old son, Pearse, for almost 2 years, and isn't allowed to talk to him by phone or have any contact whatsoever.
Zaitschek, known as Larry the Chef, was named by the PSNI's Special Branch as the chief suspect for the break in and robbery at its headquarters at Castlereagh in East Belfast on St Patrick's Day, 2002. No moves have been made to extradite him, and no charges have been brought against him.
There is simply no legal case against Zaitschek, according to his solicitor, Joe Rice. "This is a man who has been made public enemy number one on the basis of the most tenuous link with a crime he strenuously denies," he said. "He has been left in legal limbo for what can only be assumed to be political reasons. It is Kafkaesque."
In November 2002, the PSNI claimed it had compiled a 3,000 page document containing the evidence against Zaitschek and that it had submitted this to the North's director of public prosecutions. It claimed forensic and other evidence had been found linking him to the raid.
The PSNI let it be known that Zaitschek's estranged wife, Lisa, had provided evidence, and that she and the couple's child. Pearse, had been taken into a witness protection scheme. Rice was told just over a week ago by the DPP's office that "the file is currently under consideration."
Rice said it was "bizarre" that the state should go to the "huge" expense of keeping the mother and child on a witness protection scheme "in relation to a case that doesn't exist." If there was any evidence, he said, Zaitschek would have been extradited and charged long since.
Zaitschek said he can't sleep at night, thinking about his son. "I am really in difficulty over this," he said. "No one ever meant anything to me like he does. What right do they have to deny a child access to his father? The US consul in Belfast recently met with Pearse, who had two policemen with him. What are they telling him about me?"
The American chef cooked for Special Branch at Castlereagh for 4 years, and had previously worked in a police station in Belfast. Ministry of Defence security checks had uncovered nothing untoward in his background. The then Chief Constable, Ronnie Flanagan, personally thanked him for his services during one Drumcree week.
He worked out regularly in the gym at the complex. He was moving back to the US and had finished up at the Castlereagh canteen the weekend before the raid, but he was in the gym – accompanied by Pearse – the night it happened. "Me and about 200 others," he said. "I saw not a blessed thing out of the ordinary."
That evening, three men allegedly overpowered and tied up a guard, before making off with, police sources later claimed, a notebook containing the names and addresses of special branch officers along with the code names by which they were known to their informants.
A police source told one reporter that it was as important as the seizure by Allied Forces of the German army's encryption machine during the Second World War. The then Lord Mayor of Belfast, the UUP's Jim Rodgers, said he didn't believe paramilitaries were involved, and compared it with the fire which destroyed the offices of Sir John Stevens while he was investigating collusion. "The whole thing stinks to high heaven," he said. Flanagan also indicated that he believed it was an "inside" job.
However, within 24 hours, police had told UUP leader and then First Minister, David Trimble, that the IRA was responsible. Soon afterwards, follow up raids by the PSNI in republican West Belfast led to claims that IRA targeting lists had been discovered. In October, police claimed they had broken up a major IRA spy ring. It was claimed that documents had been found linking one of those arrested, Sinn Féin's administrator at Stormont, Denis Donaldson, with Zaitschek - including a photograph and an invitation to Zaitschek's wedding.
"I'm a friendly guy," said Zaitschek. "I know plenty of people. I used to be friendly with Donaldson. I was friendly with a lot of policemen, too."
Millions of pounds were spent re-locating members of the security forces. Unionists claimed they could no longer share power with Sinn Féin and withdrew from the executive at Stormont, collapsing the government.
Charges against one of those accused in the "Stormontgate" affair have been dropped, while those against three others, including Donaldson, have been reduced. Charges related to possession of secret and restricted Northern Ireland office documents have been withdrawn. All the accused deny the charges.
Last week, at a preliminary hearing into that case in Belfast, one of the accused, Ciaran Kearney, claimed the "spy ring" was a "fantasy", and that Special Branch had "endangered the Good Friday Agreement" in an "act of political subversion." A British inquiry into Castlereagh headed by Sir John Chilcott found no evidence of involvement by state agencies.
Zaitschek moved to New York, as planned, shortly after the raid. "It was a big career advance for me," he said. Arrangements were in place for him to return to NI every five weeks to visit Pearse. "I'd been interviewed twice about Castlereagh and the police knew my plans and my whereabouts," he said. The PSNI has since interviewed him in New York.
After Zaitschek revealed he had visited this country over the New Year, the PSNI said it would arrest him if he was caught in the North. He is unable to contest his lack of access to his child because to do so he would have to appear in a NI court. "If I thought I'd be treated fairly, I'd go back," he said. "But I don't trust them."
