The Spy Who Jailed the Omagh Bomb Plotter | Inside Britain's Vast Espionage Network | 4

Summary

The Spy Who: The Spy Who Jailed the Omagh Bomb Plotter – Inside Britain's Vast Espionage Network | Episode 2

Podcast: The Spy Who
Host: Charles Higson
Guest: Cara McGoogan (Author, Journalist, Host of "Bed of Lies")
Date: January 27, 2026

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Overview

This episode delves into the intricate and ethically fraught world of British espionage during the Troubles in Northern Ireland, focusing specifically on recently uncovered findings about one of the most notorious British agents: "Steak Knife." The conversation with investigative journalist Cara McGoogan explores the implications of Operation Canova, the clandestine workings of intelligence networks, and the murky moral terrain in which these spies—and their handlers—operated. The discussion places Steak Knife in context with the broader espionage network, reflecting on the cost to victims’ families, the political legacy, and unresolved questions lingering into the present.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. Operation Canova and the Unmasking of Steak Knife

• [02:24] Cara McGoogan: Operation Canova investigated “Steak Knife”—widely believed to be Freddie Scappatici—over an eight-year period, at a cost of nearly £50 million.
• [03:05] The report found Steak Knife involved in 14 murders and 15 abductions, all while being part of the IRA’s feared “Nutting Squad,” tasked with rooting out and executing suspected informants.
• [03:05] “MI5 was aware of what Steak Knife was doing, and this was viewed as acceptable. He was paid tens of thousands of pounds… helped to buy a car and a house…. even flown out in military aircraft for a break.”

2. The Complicated Identification of Steak Knife

• [05:32] Policy of Denial: The UK government refuses to officially confirm that Freddie Scappatici was Steak Knife, citing a policy of “neither confirm nor deny” for agent identities.
  • [05:49] “If they break the policy in this one instance… that opens them up to having to break it in other instances.” – McGoogan

3. The Paradox of Intelligence and Consequences

• [07:11] Do spies like Steak Knife save lives or cost more lives than they help? Intelligence was often not used to prevent murders if it meant exposing the agent.
  • “Lives were allowed to be lost in order to protect his cover. As one person said to me, you don’t get intelligence from the IRA by making the tea.” – McGoogan [07:41]
• [07:58] Security services did benefit—spies provided a heads-up when MI5 operatives were in danger, and information about weapons caches—but actionable intelligence to actually prevent attacks was rare.

4. British Espionage Operations: Scale and Methods

• [12:38] There were likely “hundreds if not thousands of agents throughout the Troubles on both sides in the IRA and in the loyalist paramilitaries.” Steak Knife was just the “tip of the iceberg.”
• [13:29] UK intelligence sought live operational information from paramilitaries but often calculated when not to act, to avoid exposing their assets.

5. The Infiltration Dilemma

• [14:34] Due to Northern Ireland’s tight-knit communities, British agencies often tried to turn insiders—using approaches ranging from blackmail to long-term relationship-building.
• [16:31] Example: Joe Fenton, estate agent, was coerced into informing after being caught with explosives; was ultimately killed for his collaboration.
• [17:20] Profiling and subtle relationship-building were common strategies.

6. Influence and Manipulation: The British ‘Chess Game’

• [18:46] “It was as though there was a game of chess being played with the IRA on one side and loyalists on the other, and the British turned the lights off, moved the pieces into position, and then turned them back on.” – McGoogan relays an analogy from a former Chief Constable
• [20:04] Examples given of agents essentially ‘manufactured’ by British intelligence—such as Kevin Fulton—who participated in bomb-making and killings at the behest of their handlers.

7. Emotional and Societal Fallout

• [22:10] McGoogan shares stories of the ongoing trauma faced by victims’ families, often still left without answers.
• “This happened in our lifetimes, and we’ve just sort of left Northern Ireland to pick up the pieces on its own.” – McGoogan [22:10]
• [23:48] With the recent release of the Canova Report, McGoogan observes, “I think there’s a feeling that now this is out, they can speak for the first time… but also… they’re still waiting on an apology from the IRA… and from the state. So there’s lots that still needs to happen.”

8. Legal and Political Aftermath

• [24:58] Victims’ families are turning to civil courts, with the Canova Report offering new grounds for legal action—since criminal prosecutions have largely been ruled out.
• [28:12] Agents were “protected from investigation and charges because they were an agent,” highlighting deep systemic failings.

9. The Fates of Spies Post-Troubles

• [28:46] Not all spies entered witness protection; many returned quietly to civilian life, though some—like Denis Donaldson—were killed after exposure.
• [29:58] Unanswered Questions: “Lots of documents have been sealed because of national security… families are still seeking answers in their individual cases.” – McGoogan

10. Systemic Accountability and Historical Truth

• [31:05] Despite revelations, no high-level handlers or officials have been held accountable; not even the head of FRU, Gordon Kerr, has faced questioning.
• [32:00] “I think it was worse than I ever imagined…. There are many differing perspectives… it became very clear that we might not be able to [establish the truth] definitively in this case…” – McGoogan
• [32:45] Quoting Geraldine Finucane: “If you don’t leave a wound to heal, it will fester.”

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• On operatives’ moral calculus:
  “Lives were allowed to be lost in order to protect his cover. As one person said to me, ‘you don’t get intelligence from the IRA by making the tea.’” – Cara McGoogan [07:41]

• On government denial:
  “If they break the policy in this one instance… that opens them up to having to break it in other instances.” – McGoogan [05:49]

• On manipulation and control:
  “It was as though there was a game of chess being played… the British turned the lights off, moved the pieces… then turned them back on.” – McGoogan (citing a former Chief Constable) [18:46]

• On the scale of state secrecy:
  “For me… going into this, my history teacher said don’t answer the question on Northern Ireland, it’s too complicated… But this was like, this happened in our lifetimes in our country and we’ve just sort of left Northern Ireland to pick up the pieces on its own.” – McGoogan [22:10]

• On the impossibility of full truth:
  “There are many differing perspectives. Like each person you speak to will have a different version of the truth... It became very clear that we might not be able to [establish the truth] definitively in this case, which is a story in itself.” – McGoogan [32:00]

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Key Timestamps

• [03:05] Overview of Operation Canova findings on Steak Knife
• [05:32] Discussion of the UK’s “Neither Confirm Nor Deny” policy
• [07:41] Ethics of intelligence and decision-making not to act
• [12:38] Scale of British infiltration during the Troubles
• [14:34] Difficulties in infiltrating the IRA, recruitment methods
• [18:46] “Chessboard” analogy for British influence and manipulation
• [22:10] Impact on families and societal ignorance
• [23:48] Family reactions to the Steak Knife report
• [24:58] Civil litigation as the only avenue for justice
• [28:46] Fates of spies post-Troubles
• [31:05] Systemic lack of accountability
• [32:00] Reflections on the impossibility of full historical truth

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Overall Tone

The tone is investigative, somber, and candid, unafraid to acknowledge the brutality, complexity, and ongoing relevance of the subject. Both Higson and McGoogan highlight the moral ambiguities faced by agencies and agents alike, while repeatedly centering the voices and suffering of ordinary citizens and victims' families left in the shadows of state secrets and violence.

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For Further Listening

• Cara McGoogan’s podcast: Bed of Lies (Troubles explored in Season 3)
• Upcoming episode topic preview: “The Spy Who Sold Codes and Cocaine in 1970s America”—the case of Christopher Boyce

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Transcript

[A]

From Audible Originals, I'm James Bond novelist Charlie Higson and this is the Spy who. Thank you for joining us for our final episode of the Spy who Jailed the Omar bomb plotter. David Rupert is a spy who stood at the crossroads in Irish and British political history. With the Good Friday agreement signed, various hardline Republicans vowed to keep fighting for a united Ireland. Nicknamed the Big Yank for his towering 6 foot 7 frame, David certainly did not blend in and yet he was able to infiltrate one of the world's most violent terrorist organizations, eventually helping to bring Michael McKivitt, one of the Omar bomb plotters, to justice. But David Rupert was actually only one of many spies to infiltrate the ira. In this episode we're going to focus on a recent report which asks troubling questions about of the most famous spies from that period. Steak Knife. I'm talking with author and journalist Kara McGoughan. She uncovers and investigates British scandals and her latest project is the podcast Bed of lies. Season three finds her investigating the use of MI5 agents during the so called Troubles, including Steak Knife. Steak Knife was a high ranking IRA member who secretly worked as a British intelligence agent while allegedly being involved in interrogating and killing suspected loyalist informants. As we'll discuss, it's a strange paradox that through agents like Steak Knife, more lives were lost than saved. And he wasn't the only one executing at will. The report, known as the Kenover Report, was released in late 2025 and covers how MI5 knew what their agents were up to, raising urgent questions about how far British intelligence was will to go to influence and meddle in the political landscape of Northern Ireland. Welcome Cara, thanks so much for joining me on the Spy who.

[B]

Hello. Thank you for having me on.

[A]

This must be a busy time for you as someone who's been covering spies during the Troubles.

[B]

Yeah, we've just had the final report from the Canova inquiry which has been looking into Steak Knife, one of the most notorious agents of the Troubles. And that's given us a sort of full rundown of this eight year police investigation that cost nearly 50 million pounds, which has been looking into murders he was involved in, tortures he was involved in, what his handlers knew and ultimately asking the question, you know, should we have been using him as a spy? So that's been, it's been very busy with that report coming out and the kind of digging into it, looking at what, what it said and what it's finally concluded.

[A]

So can you tell us about Operation Canova? What were the findings?

[B]

So this spy steak Knife, widely believed to be Freddy Scappatici, which we'll come on to why I'm phrasing it like that, in a second. He was found to have been involved in 14 murders and 15 abductions. He was in the Nutting squad, which was the IRA's internal security unit. They rooted out spies in the IRA and then killed them. But all the while he himself was a spy. MI5 was aware of what Steak Knife was doing and this was viewed as acceptable. He was paid tens of thousands of pound for his work, including at certain points being helped to buy a car and a house. He was taken on a few holidays by his handlers at times when things were a bit too stressful. He needed a break, he needed a bit of wooing, flown out in military aircraft for a break.

[A]

What is the hoped for outcome of this? I mean, other than just saying this happened, Is it looking at laying blame at people?

[B]

At the heart of it is a quest by families whose loved ones were tortured and killed by Steak Knife, who want to know what actually happened and who was involved, how high up the chain of command it went. What did the army know, what did the police know? Could their loved ones have been saved? But this is happening decades after the fact and at this point, what you might think a police investigation would strive towards convictions is not going to happen. The PPS said they're not going to bring any charges off the back of this report.

[A]

How did the report come about?

[B]

So after Freddy's Capaticci was exposed in the press as the agent's steak knife, it kick started a big police investigation. The long, longest running police inquiry in the UK's history, the Stevens Inquiry. And it had many chapters, starting with looking at a loyalist agent, Brian Nelson, moving on to kind of more forms of collusion. And then they opened Stevens 4, which was looking into the work of Freddy Scappertici. But the sort of money dwindled over the years. The interest and also the kind of Stevens Inquiry were finding it very hard to really get anywhere. And so their work was sort of packed into 32 boxes which gathered dust for the best part of a DEC. And in 2012 the steak knife files were reopened. Families of some of Freddie Scapatici's victims had urged the police ombudsman to review the evidence that was in these boxes and they found new leads. So in 2016, a second criminal investigation into Steak Knife began and that was Operation Canova.

[A]

Now, the one thing that you've hinted at is this complicated business that the UK still refuses to officially name Steak Knife Freddie Scappetici. What would they lose or what would they give away by saying, yes, they are the same person?

[B]

The report hasn't been able to kind of write down in paper that Freddie Scapatici was the agent Steak Knife, which I know that the lead of the Canova report, John Boucher has been very angry about. The establishment would say that if they break the policy in this one instance, policy of neither confirm nor deny, then that opens them up to having to break it in other instances. And that could put the lives of agents and former agents and handlers at risk. They have been occasions when they have broken that policy. So it, it, I think maybe they've just gone so far down the line with Freddie Scapitici that at this point they're just. They might as well dig their heels in till the very end.

[A]

So the whole of this report has been done where they're only talking about this character, Steak Knife.

[B]

No. So the report is quite funny because it has sections on Steak Knife and it has detailed sections on Freddy Scappatici. So Freddie Scappatici is a named character and all of his work is in there as well as Steak Knife, but they just can't write that final line that says Steak Knife is Freddy Scappertici.

[A]

There's this idea that he has basically been involved in killing more people than his intelligence saved. But is he driving that or is he just doing what he's told?

[B]

Yeah, that's a very good question and one that we can't necessarily know. What we do know is that there are times when Steak Knife has told his handlers that a certain person is going to be interrogated and the location of that interrogation. And his handlers have been well aware of that, but they haven't intervened to stop. To stop the killing from happening. So the question is, I guess he wasn't necessarily passing that intelligence in order to save the life of the person, because if, if the military swooped, that would blow his cover.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

So there were lives that were allowed to be lost in order to protect his cover. As one person said to me, you know, you don't get intelligence from the IRA by making the tea.

[A]

So what is the useful stuff that he's passing on that is acted on?

[B]

Well, that's a good question and one that I think, you know, there's been a lot of debate about. It's helpful for the security services to know when their agents are being suspected by the IRA so that they can get them to Safety. I mean, operationally, he's not in the position of kind of planning bombing attacks. So this isn't an agent who is kind of feeding back. There will be a bomb at this place at this time that can then be intercepted. But he was high up in the ira, so he would have had access to some information from the agents he's interrogating and from the people he's associating with of where there might be kind of big weapons, stashes, things like that. So it is a debate about kind of was he this like, prize asset? Because he's not militarily planning attacks for the ira. I know this series is about David Rupert and he's got a high profile for different reasons. He was operating a bit later, but helped bring the OMA bomber to justice. I think either spies, intelligence should be used to stop attacks, or in the aftermath of attacks, to bring the attackers to justice. The bad agents, as it were, their intelligence was neither used to stop attacks or bring people to justice from what I found.

[A]

So when MI5 found out about the killings and, and what he was up to, what happened?

[B]

So this wasn't being conducted in secret in terms of what the intelligence services knew, the army were working alongside MI5. There aren't lines saying what an agent can and can't do. You know, really, they're allowed to do what, whatever's needed in order to protect.

[A]

And how did they originally turn him, as it were?

[B]

So this is a question that lots of people have kind of speculated on over the years. There's been stories of him being involved in some sort of tax fraud or sexual crime, and the police kind of offering him this kind of get out of jail card in order to become a spy. But there's also a story of a former army handler who said that he kind of met Steak Knife in the pub and he became friendly with him and he. It was actually that his relationship with Scapatici that brought him onto the military side. The report had a couple of lines about how he became an agent. It didn't give us a huge amount more, but it did say that Freddy Scapatici had wanted for quite some time to become an agent. So he'd become disillusioned in some way and he wanted to kind of bring forward information to the military about the ira.

[A]

But he of all people knew what the consequences were if he was found out by the ira. Do we know any, anything about how he he deal?

[B]

I don't know how he felt about that. He spoke very little himself. Of kind of his time as a spy, there's very little known about him. Yeah, when you think about the stuff he was involved in, you know, like the shootings, where people were so unrecognizable that they had to be identified by their jewelry, it's not screaming someone that's kind of ruminating on their actions, is it?

[A]

And do we know whether the IRA did try and get to him him afterwards?

[B]

So he. There was a quite a strange pact made that after he was outed, the IRA sort of stood by him. So he's exposed in the press, and he then does a press conference with the IRA and comes out and says, I'm not a spy. And the IRA sort of stand by him. He actually then brazens it out and returns to Belfast. So he. He really is kind of quite brashly trying to front this out in the long run, that's not possible. And he does end up kind of being taken to the south of England and being given a new identity. But I think he hated that. He liked being this kind of like, man about Belfast having the power. And people I spoke to did say in that in those years after he was exposed, he had what's called a narcissistic collapse. And so he started kind of behaving quite erratically, made things quite hard for his handlers and the people trying to protect him. But ultimately he was forced into this kind of quiet suburban life in Surrey.

[A]

So this is one individual case. I mean, can you give us an idea as the extent of British espionage during the Troubles? I mean, are there many more of these. These types of cases, do you think, that are going to come out?

[B]

So Steak Knife is. Is seen as this kind of most notorious agent, but he is really just the tip of the iceberg, to use a cliche. I spoke to one former Chief Constable of Northern Ireland, and he was actually in charge after the Troubles. But he said that he came into power and looked at the agents they were running, and they had so many agents that they were effectively running the Loyalists. And he stood them down. So, you know, we're talking hundreds if not thousands of agents throughout the Troubles on both sides in the IRA and in the loyalist paramilitaries. And there's probably many that we don't know about. There could be someone much worse than him, but they haven't been exposed. So that's definitely a thing that kind of people suspect is that there might be others.

[A]

So what kind of information would the British harvest through using these methods?

[B]

So spies were involved in Getting sort of live information from inside paramilitaries on operations that were being planned, you know, be it people that were going to be targeted for killings, bombing attacks that might happen, but also to gather information on the people involved, like who was in a certain IRA unit, who was in a loyalist unit, who was involved in plotting and carrying out said attacks. So in an ideal world, that information would be used to kind of catch the perpetrators, prevent the attacks. But what we found across the board is that that wasn't really happening because you do that and it compromises your spy and they're found out. So the intelligence officers had to play a kind of calculated game of which intelligence they acted upon and which they didn't. So that I know that there was kind of rules in place that you had to have got a piece of intelligence from multiple sources so that, you know, the blame could be, was disparate so it wouldn't point fingers in one direction at your spy.

[A]

Why was it so hard for the British to infiltrate the ira?

[B]

Well, I think there's certainly a point in the Troubles when, you know, the Brits weren't winning and it was very hard to kind of access this closed society. And the community in Northern Ireland is very small. Lots of people went to school together, they grew up around the corner, they know each other. And so it was very hard to infiltrate the IRA as an outsider, which is why they might try and find someone from the local area. The IRA were very clever. They kind of split into kind of small units to make sure that, you know, information sharing was kind of kept contained. And it was after a few big incidents like the Brighton bomb that targeted Thatcher and the killing of Mountbatten, when there was a kind of big push to like beef up the intelligence war and recruit spies and, you know, get a handle on it. Which came all the way from Thatcher. We're talking here about police, Special Branch, the Army's force research unit, MI5 and MI6. So that in a sense shows you a sense of scale.

[A]

Can you just clarify what is FRU or fru? The Force Research Unit.

[B]

So the Force Research Unit was a specialist unit of the army in Northern Ireland which was dedicated to running spas. It was found that within the Force Research Unit of the army there was a Special Division put together just to run steak knife called the Rat Hole.

[A]

Right, so it's basically British Military Intelligence.

[B]

Yes.

[A]

And was that, was that something that only existed in Northern Ireland?

[B]

Yeah, that was set up in Northern Ireland after those big attacks I mentioned with Mountbatten and in order to gain intelligence from inside the paramilitaries.

[A]

Now, just to backtrack a bit, and you did touch on this before about how the British attempted to recruit people from the community. I mean, what were the sort of things they were trying to pick up on of thinking, all right, this might be someone who we could turn.

[B]

There were times when people were kind of maybe picked up by the police for something and then given the opportunity to inform. So one good example of this was Joe Fenton, who was later killed by Scapatici. He was an estate agent in the West Belfast area. He wasn't part of the IRA, but he was accepting of the IRA's kind of actions and he would help, like move weapons around or let the IRA store weapons in his empty houses and helped IRA members leaving prison find somewhere to live, that sort of thing. He was once caught with explosives that he was helping transport for the ira and the police said to him, well, why don't you help us? And so he actually didn't feel like he had a choice. He didn't want to be an informer. He tried to get out of it, but. But he wasn't able to. And so he started working for Special Branch. And what that meant was when he had these empty houses that he was allowing the IRA to have meetings in, Special Branch were bugging those houses beforehand so they could listen in on top IRA meetings. So he was what's known as an eyes and ears spy. So very useful, but not part of the action himself. But there was sort of one too many operations that were foiled. And then an IRA member found a gun in one of Joe Fenton's house, which had clearly been tampered with by the Brits. And so he was called in for questioning by Freddie Scapatici and the nutting squad. So that's a sort of example of like someone being turned because they had. They'd been involved in some sort of petty criminality. I know that there's also kind of intelligence. People did a lot of work on profiling potential spies and then finding moments to approach them. So they're Frank Hegarty and Derry. So he was actually an IRA member. The legend goes that he was kind of walking his dog when a member of the army approached him kind of in a quiet area and sort of started talking to him about greyhounds, which he loved, and then sort of ultimately fostered that relationship and encouraged him to start feeding them information.

[A]

So there's huge resources being pumped in from the British side. To what extent were the British Controlling the war.

[B]

One person has described this to me. It was as though there was a game of chess being played with the IRA on one side and the loyalists on the other. And the British turned the lights off, moved the pieces into position and then turned the back on. So that idea that they had enough pieces across the board who they were in touch with that they could sort of direct what was happening. Now I'm not sure we'll ever know the truth of that. There are agents who were kind of involved in the political machinations, you know, helping to steer the IRA towards politics away from violence. And so I'm sure also that we've got those who were involved in helping prevent attacks. There were agents so high up in the paramilitaries that they did hold positions of power that in that regard you could say that the Brits were involved in kind of directing what was happening. Depending on who you speak to in Northern Ireland, you'll get very different answers on this one. So it's hard to definitively, I mean.

[A]

And is there a case that these IRA members and also loyalist paramilitaries were being manipulated by British intelligence? Were they being goaded or pushed further than they might have done had the British not intervened?

[B]

There were certainly agents who would have never been involved if it wasn't for the British. There's one agent I looked at who was a soldier, Peter Keeley, known by the pseudonym Kevin Fulton. He was from Northern Ireland. And he was then approached by military intelligence and said, well, rather than being a soldier, would you actually leave the army, like leave in air quotes and go and join the ira? And he ended up climbing through the ranks as a bomb maker and he was involved in making bombs and conducting operations that ended up killing a police officer and one of his former fellow soldiers. And we know about this cause he wrote a book about his time in the IRA called Unsung Hero. So very much self aggrandizing. And I spoke to a family who they discovered that he was one of the gunmen who had stormed into their house in the middle of the night, balaclava and shot their dad. And they found out years later when this book came out that this agent had been involved in breaking into their house because. Cause they read the book.

[A]

So Kara, with your podcast Bed of Lies, you explore state sponsored cover ups and the crossing of moral and legal lines by those states. How were you able to get at the truth of what happened? Because I imagine the truth would have been incredibly hard to get.

[B]

Yes, well in this case it's hard to know if we'll ever fully know the truth. But I came at this story from having spoken to families who have been seeking justice and answers for decades, whose loved ones were killed by paramilitaries, but including people they suspected of being agents and therefore have questions such as what did the police or army know? Could they have intervened to save my loved one's life? So they have kind of fought these campaigns, bringing civil lawsuits, freedom of information requests, that sort of thing to try and get answers about what happened. And it's a very, very difficult thing, especially in Northern Ireland.

[A]

I mean, I mean there are so many aspects of this story that are pretty shocking. Was there anything in particular that really shocked you?

[B]

For me, I think certainly the sense of scale and going into this, my dad's, he grew up in Scotland, he's Scottish, but his family, parts of them originally hailed from Northern Ireland. So that interest was there. But you know, I remember being at school at A level history and my history teacher said don't answer the question on Northern Ireland, it's too complicated. And I think we have this total ignorance speaking to people there who are like, thank you for telling this story. People in Westminster and London just don't care. And you know, this is part of our country, we do treat it as a kind of over there issue. But this was like this happened in our lifetimes in our country and we've just sort of left Northern Ireland to pick up the pieces on its own. And then on top of that, I think the idea of how many families are still fighting for justice, the trauma runs very deep. I spoke to one family, two children were injured. One of them, her eyes were scored like a football pitch from after glass shattered over her when gunmen shot through the car window and killed her dad. So she's got physical scars and her father was killed. And to this day she's still not got answers about what exactly happened and she's still bringing a legal case. And that's time and time again for every agent with kind of multiple victims. And then those victims families, they want to know was the British state involved in killing their loved one.

[A]

And the steak knife report has only recently come to its conclusion. Do you know how the families have reacted to it?

[B]

I think there's, there's a feeling that now this is out, they can speak for the first time. There's a deep shame in Northern Ireland of relatives of people that were suspected of being or were informers. Like I spoke to one person who said that in Northern Ireland a tout, an informer is Worse than a paedophile. So these families, they've kind of got this intense stigma from their community of their loved one having been rooted out to be a spy. But also they've got this anger at the state because the state has badly let down their relative who was working for the good, who was passing over information to the Brits, and who was then allowed to be killed by another agent. So it's this very difficult thing, I think, where they have felt silenced. But now the report has come out, I think people have feeling more confident. I think they're feeling a bit heard. They're still waiting on an apology from the IRA for killing their loved ones. We're also still waiting on an apology from the state. So there's lots that still needs to happen. But I think for them, it's like a good step forward.

[A]

I mean, does it open things up, though, for family members to take private prosecutions?

[B]

Yeah. For a long time, families in Northern Ireland have used the civil courts as their only means of redress. And so this report will now form a foundation by which more civil cases can be brought more specific ones. And so I know that lawyers and families are looking at that right now and kind of hoping that they can get, you know, some sort of compensation. Further answers through the court.

[A]

We've talked about State Knife. Can you tell us about some of the other agents who were working.

[B]

So I've mentioned his name. Brian Nelson. He was Freddie Scapatici's essential mirror in the Loyalists. He was exposed shortly before Freddy Scapatici had to go on the run. And he was head of intelligence for the uda, the Ulster Defense association, which was the biggest loyalist paramilitary. So Brian Nelson himself had been a soldier. He'd been in the Black Watch Regiment, and then he'd left and joined the UDA before then becoming an agent. So I think. And what that meant was he was involved in selecting targets for the UDA to go out and shoot and kill. He had help collecting his own intelligence from the police and army. They got a big leak of information from a local police station of kind of suspected IRA members. Lots of people in there who weren't in the IRA at all. And with this cache of information, Brian Nelson's army handlers, he was also a FRU agent, helped him kind of sift through it and basically refine the accuracy of it. And then he would hand out these cards to loyalist gunmen for who they could go and kill, all the while telling his handlers who was being targeted and who was gonna be killed. That intelligence work helped save a few lives, notably one time, Jerry Adams. But we also find that a lot of the people that Brian Nelson handed over cards on were killed. So again, this question of we've got this agent at the heart of the UDA prime position, and yet in order not to compromise him, lots of lives were lost that could have been saved. But also when Brian Nelson was like, on the verge of being exposed, the Stevens inquiry, that its offices were burnt down, they suspect that the Force Research Unit had something to do with it.

[A]

Really?

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

We've seen scenes so often in dramas and thrillers or whatever where someone's gone undercover and in order to maintain their position, they're challenged with doing something, often killing someone. And that seems like that is actually what happens.

[B]

Well, in the law, there's nothing that they can't do in order to maintain their cover, so they are allowed to, you know, kill in order to maintain their cover. And I guess we've heard those examples with Freddie Scappatici and others.

[A]

And to a certain extent, it's the system that is at fault.

[B]

Yes, well, they've been given the sort of credit card and fake identity and told, do everything you can to get closer and get the intelligence that we want. But you do see time and time again in Northern Ireland, where agents have been protected from investigation and charges because they were an agent.

[A]

And when the Good Friday Agreement is eventually signed and what happens to all of these agents on both sides, are they left in place? They go into witness protection? Are they looked after?

[B]

So I think witness protection is obviously very expensive. And so agents are only really sent into witness protection if it's kind of very dangerous and they're likely to be exposed. So I think a lot of agents, you know, troubles came to an end and they went to live a quiet life, hoping that nobody ever found out what they'd really been up to during the Troubles. That hasn't been the case. There has been agents who have been exposed and who have lost their lives. One high profile example is Dennis Donaldson, who was high up in Sinn Fein and it came out in around 2005, 2006, that he had been a spy for MI5 and the police while working inside Sinn Fein. And he was actually then shot dead so long after the troubles had ended in 2006.

[A]

And do they know who shot him?

[B]

A few years later, the real IRA came forward and said they were the ones who'd shot him. Other spies, I'm sure, have been taken out and given new identities. And those people continue to Live with protection. As you know, Scapaticci died in hiding, having never conceivably worked since he left Northern Ireland, but living quite a nice life in a half a million pound house.

[A]

And do you still have any unanswered questions about all of this?

[B]

Well, I think there's a lot of unanswered questions. Lots of documents have been sealed because of national security. I think, as I said, families are still seeking answers in their individual cases. I don't know if we ever will know the full picture of the intelligence war in Northern Ireland. There is one more inquiry coming, the Pat Finucan Inquiry. So Pat Finucan was a high profile lawyer. Multiple agents were involved in killing him, including Brian Nelson, targeted him and a Special Branch spy, William Stobe, was involved in procuring the weapon. Both the police and army have been said to have known that this was, that Pat Vanuken was being targeted, but his life wasn't saved. And so that has been a very kind of high profile, shocking case that does have a public inquiry. So we might get some answers through that. We've got some answers through the Canova report. But there is a question of should we have a proper full look at what was happening rather than these individual kind of drop in inquiries into one agent here and one agent there.

[A]

It's a very murky, complicated world, isn't it? I mean, is there a move towards holding somebody else accountable?

[B]

So at this point, no, I don't think anyone's going to be held accountable. What was interesting for me in all the recent coverage is that ultimately the head of the fru, Gordon Kerr, who I think, you know, have questions to answer for. Gordon Kerr's been named in the press. His picture's been out there. You know, why can't he come forward at this point and kind of vouch for what his unit did, why they ran Steak Knife and you know, and justify those actions. But instead those kind of handlers have very much been able to remain in the shadows. They're not being kind of approached now as people that should be held to account for Steak Knife's actions.

[A]

And did your perspective on anything change at all throughout your investigation or did it just confirm what you always suspected?

[B]

I think it was worse than I ever imagined. And I also think I learned a lot about the idea of kind of the murkiness of history and how difficult it is to pin down what really happened. And there are many differing perspectives. Like each person you speak to will have a different version of the truth. And I think as A journalist, you're seeking to try and establish the truth. But it became very clear that we might not be able to do that definitively in this case, which is a story in itself. Yeah, that is a big part of it. And actually, Geraldine Finucan, the widow of Pat Finucan, she told me, if you don't leave a wound to heal, it will fester. And I do have a feeling that that's sort of what's happened with Northern Ireland. We haven't fully healed those wounds by having full transparency and truth. And if you do that, you risk having a society that's left fractious.

[A]

So do you think that that's a lesson that those in power should learn from this? What do you think their takeaway should be, and will they learn from it and change?

[B]

I would love them to learn from it. As I said, I personally wonder if there needs to be some sort of inquiry that involves transparency, but I don't think it will happen. I think. I guess we'll see what happens with the Pat Finucan inquiry. The labor government has rode back on the legacy act of the Conservative government, which was seeking to sort shut down Troubles cases. So that is being reformed, which I think families are happy about, but, you know, it's still very much a live issue.

[A]

Well, thank you so much, Kara, for talking to us. And, yes, I mean, it probably poses as many questions as were answered.

[B]

Yes, the podcast series ended up being sort of 10 hours of material, and I didn't even scratch the surface, so there's very much more to be said.

[A]

Well, brilliant. Well, if, obviously, if our listeners want to go into this in much more detail, then they should listen to your podcast. Can you remind us what it's called again?

[B]

Yeah, it's called Bed of Lies, and the Trouble series is series three.

[A]

Excellent. Thank you, Cara.

[B]

Thank you.

[A]

Once again, listening to the series and doing this interview, I'm struck by the weird cafe world of espionage almost verging on. On fast sometimes. Although that's not the right word to use when you're talking about the Troubles. But this idea that there are so many agents and double agents out there, and then that the. The horrific idea that they've got to go so far to maintain their cover, that they're actually doing more damage than they would if they weren't involved with the British side of it at all. All K used the. The. The chess analogy at one point that. That the British had sort of set up the pieces where the game starts. And you would think if you're essentially playing chess against yourself that you would be in complete control. Thank you for listening and do join us for the next series of the Spy who hosted by Raza Jeff Next time we open the file on Christopher Boyce, the spy who sold codes and cocaine in 1970s America. The youth have become disillusioned and Christopher Boyce, a college dropout from an all American family, is about to strike at the very heart of the USA's espionage machine, the repercussions of which will be felt for decades. Follow this by who now wherever you listen to podcasts. From Audible Originals. This is the final episode in our series the Spy who Jailed the Omar Bomb plotter. This episode of the Spy who was hosted by me, Charles Higson. Our show was produced by Vespucci with story consultancy by Yellow Ant for Audible. The senior producer was Ashley Clivery. Our sound designer was Alex Port Felix. The supervising producer was Natalia Rodriguez. Music supervisor is Scott Velasquez for Frisson Sync. Executive producers for Vespucci were Johnny Galaxies and Daniel Turkan. The executive producer for Yellow Ant was Tristan Donovan. Executive producers for Audible were Estelle Doyle, Theodora Leludis and Marshall Louis.