The owner of a Co Down vehicle recovery company has received a Real IRA death threat after his lorry was identified removing a vehicle seized in connection with the Omagh bomb inquiry.
It is understood that police informed the 61-year-old owner of Recovery Services of Newry that his life is in danger from dissident republicans after he was identified removing a vehicle from a farmyard in Jonesborough, Co Armagh, as part of the police investigation into the Omagh bomb.
The man, who has been battling cancer for three years and did not want to be named, has since left the country and is anxious that the threat against him be lifted.
But the business's manager Caroline Craven last night (Thursday) insisted that the company was not involved in police investigations into paramilitary activity and is angry that the firm has been placed in danger.
"He (the company owner) does not even work here anymore because of his illness and had come down to open up the yard that morning," Ms Craven said.
"He was opening up when the police telephoned and said that an abandoned car was lying in a ditch near Jonesborough and asked if we could take it away.
"But when he arrived there he was directed into a farmyard and told to take away a vehicle that was lying in a ditch.
"He thought that he had been called out to an abandoned car and if we had known what this vehicle was being taken away for we would not have been involved."
But Ms Craven says she cannot understand why her company was asked to recover a vehicle which was part of a police investigation.
"The police have their own recovery vehicles for that kind of thing and all we do is take away cars involved in road traffic accidents," she said.
"Now this poor man has been told that his life is in danger and he has had to leave the country."
And she added that the incident has now led to other recovery firms across the north expressing concerns that they too could be put in danger.
"A lot of the companies involved in vehicle recoveries had a meeting after this threat and are worried that they may now be put in the same position.
"We have a mixed workforce and work in all parts of the community and have no interest in being involved in anything controversial.
"All we want now is for this threat to be lifted so that this man can get on with his life."
A police spokeswoman last night declined to comment on the threat issued against the Newry man.
