A soldier in Derry on Bloody Sunday has alleged that his statement detailing civilians being shot with their arms up had been torn up by solicitors acting for the Widgery Enquiry, the Saville Tribunal heard today. Soldier 027's account was contained in a dossier compiled by the Irish government and may have originated in a newspaper archive.
The soldier, then a 20-year-old radio operator, was quoted as seeing his colleagues shooting up Rossville St and then seeing two bodies fall across a barricade there. He is also said to have claimed that, in Glenfada Park, another colleague, soldier H, fired a shot that went through one man, killing him, and into another. He said soldier H then fired again, killing the wounded man.
Soldier 027 also claimed that paratroopers where using lethal dum-dum bullets, and had been told to get some kills by a senior officer. The soldier, in an account apparently taken from a taped interview, detailed giving his statement to a solicitor acting for the Widgery Enquiry, who it is claimed tore it up in front of him and returned 10 minutes later with another that bore no relation to fact.
However, Christopher Clarke QC, who is continuing his opening statement for the current enquiry, said that the solicitor who, it was claimed had done this, had described the account as a falsehood and a total fabrication.
