Four years after the murder of Rosemary Nelson her killers are at large and the murder hunt has effectively ended. Her family now say a public inquiry is the only way forward. Steven McCaffery reports.
In 1996 a solicitor in a modest legal firm, in a small town, added a number of controversial cases to her workload.
She proved to be an imaginative and hardworking advocate for her new clients, but success also brought her many enemies.
Within three years, she was dead.
From the point of view of Rosemary Nelson's relatives, this is the story of her death put in its starkest terms.
Their belief that the four-year investigation into her killing has effectively ended, without anyone being charged, has led them to fear that the full story of her murder may never be known.
Yesterday they said they were now "placing their trust" in retired Canadian Supreme Court judge Peter Cory.
Next month he will report to the Irish and British governments on six controversial killings, including Mrs Nelson's.
While security force collusion is alleged in each case, he will identify those which he believes warrant public inquiries.
Mrs Nelson's mother, her brother Eunan and sisters Caitlin and Bernie now say police have told them the investigation is effectively over.
After four years, and having spent in excess of £7 million, the Rosemary Nelson murder team has charged 17 people with offences unrelated to the killing, but has failed to bring anyone before the courts for the crime it was formed to investigate.
It is understood police have identified a former soldier and a police informant among 10 suspects they were tracking.
Mrs Nelson's relatives say their concerns have been heightened by their latest meeting with the investigators.
It has only now emerged that in July the family met Detective Chief Superintendent Arthur Provost, the officer who has led the investigation since the departure of deputy chief constable of Norfolk Colin Port. The family say Mr Provost told them that in the absence of new leads, the investigation was effectively over.
He is also said to have told them that his team had interviewed convicted loyalist murderer Trevor McKeown following his claims earlier this year that in 1997 two RUC officers urged him to kill Mrs Nelson.
Now police are said to have linked the two officers named by McKeown to an inquiry before Mrs Nelson's death – the so-called Mulvihill investigation – when it was claimed police that interviewing her clients were threatening her life.
The officers named by McKeown agreed to be interviewed by the Nelson team, but denied the latest allegation.
It is understood there is no evidence to support McKeown's claims, which he made during a bid to overturn his own conviction for the murder of Catholic teenager Bernadette Martin.
However, the family say the episode adds weight to their criticism that the murder team never reinterviewed RUC officers accused of threatening Mrs Nelson.
The murder team has pointed out that Mulvihill found insufficient evidence to warrant the prosecution of any officer over the threat claims, and so no further action would be taken without new evidence.
But Mrs Nelson's brother Eunan said: "This showed up the inadequacies in Colin Port's (investigation).
"He always refused to look down this specific path. We had asked him for four years to do this."
Eunan said the family now felt that the Port team became involved in solving other crimes that could have been tackled by the RUC.
Bernie said: "They wasted a lot of money and resources to do something that could have been done in the mid-Ulster area by the RUC, even before the creation of the PSNI.
"In 2001 we wrote to Colin Port saying we did not believe the investigation was going to solve Rosemary's case, but they continued against the family's wishes."
The Rosemary Nelson team last night confirmed that Mr Provost had met the family who were "appraised of the current state of the investigation".
But it also said that while "many of the main lines of inquiry have been exhausted", 25 officers would continue to work on the investigation, which was "still active".
Rosemary Nelson (40) was married with three young children and ran her own legal firm in Lurgan, Co Armagh.
Her work was largely routine, and she gained a reputation as a sympathetic listener, and an effective solicitor.
But by 1996 she had a number of high-profile clients, including Lurgan republican Colin Duffy, convicted for the murder of a former soldier. In September 1996 he was acquitted amid widespread publicity after the key prosecution witness against him was exposed as a member of the loyalist UVF.
Nine months later there was further controversy when Duffy was arrested for the murder of two police officers in Lurgan, only for the case to collapse.
Mrs Nelson's clients later began to claim that police officers questioning them were threatening her life. The alleged threats echoed those levelled at Pat Finucane in the run-up to his death, and Mrs Nelson decided to go public.
In an address at the US congress she said the "threats" came from an inability to "distinguish me as a professional lawyer from the alleged crimes and causes of my clients".
Her case was among those considered by United Nations investigator Param Cumaraswamy, who reported that "the RUC has engaged in activities which constitute intimidation" of lawyers.
As the Garvaghy Road Residents' Coalition emerged to oppose Orange Order parades in Portadown, it asked Mrs Nelson, based nearby in Lurgan, to carry out legal work for it.
But the Drumcree standoff was to spiral out of control, placing her at the centre of a bitter and often violent dispute.
The twists in Mrs Nelson's career continued when in 1997 Catholic father-of-three Robert Hamill was killed by a loyalist mob in view of a nearby police patrol in Portadown. She raised the profile of this case to the extent that it too has also been reviewed by Peter Cory.
While any one of these cases could have brought Rosemary Nelson onto controversial territory, her role in all three made her a high-profile figure in a part of Northern Ireland which was home to some of the most notorious loyalist paramilitaries.
On Monday March 15 1999, a booby-trap bomb exploded beneath her car in an attack claimed by the Red Hand Defenders, a cover name used by elements of the LVF and UDA.
But fears of security force collusion were fuelled by the sophistication of the device used, as well as the long-running allegations of security force threats. People living near Mrs Nelson's home also reported an unusually high level of security force activity prior to the attack.
Despite an international campaign for an independent inquiry, the authorities instead formed an investigating team made up of the RUC and English police officers, led by Colin Port. Investigators now say they have intelligence on the murderers, but no evidence.
Mrs Nelson's loved ones say the questions they raised four years ago remain unanswered.
STATEMENT FROM RELATIVES
A joint statement issued by Rosemary Nelson's mother, brothers and sisters summarised their call for an inquiry saying:
We believe there was collusion by setting the context for Rosemary's murder by threatening her and other lawyers, and labelling them as IRA sympathisers.
We believe there was collusion by omission in that serious evidence of threats by police officers and others against Rosemary was never properly investigated.
There was a significant security force presence in the area before the murder which has not been satisfactorily answered.
Perhaps most significantly of all, we understand from discussions with the Port team that some of those directly involved in the murder were agents of the state, either directly by serving in the army, or by being informers for Special Branch. In light of this we believe that Judge Cory must recommend a public inquiry.
