There is no evidence against a veteran republican charged in connection with one of Northern Ireland's most notorious murders, a court has heard.
Ivor Bell, 77, from Ramoan Gardens in west Belfast faces counts of aiding and abetting the killing of Jean McConville and of IRA membership.
A hearing in Belfast's Laganside court complex was told the evidence, which includes tape recordings from researchers at Boston College, was inadmissible.
Solicitor Peter Corrigan, representing Bell, said: "The evidence presented at the police station does not amount to a row of beans."
Ms McConville, a widow, was dragged from her home in the Divis flats by an IRA gang of up to 12 men and women after being accused of passing information to the British Army in Belfast, an allegation discredited by the Northern Ireland Police Ombudsman.
She was shot in the back of the head and buried 50 miles from her home.
The IRA did not admit her murder until 1999 when information was passed on to police in the Irish Republic.
She became one of the so-called Disappeared, and it was not until August 2003 that her remains were eventually found on Shelling Hill beach, Co Louth.
Nobody has ever been charged with her murder.
Objecting to a Public Prosecution Service request for a four-to-six week adjournment, Mr Corrigan claimed the well-publicised lack of police resources for legacy cases meant his "elderly" client was not being treated fairly.
He said: "We know that the PSNI has stated that they are not resourced to look into the cases for example of Bloody Sunday and the murders by the Glenanne gang."
Mr Corrigan added: "My client is entitled to be treated equally before the law. It is something which we intend to put forward -- why Ivor Bell is not being treated equally?"
District Judge Fiona Bagnall said the issue was not a matter for the magistrates' court.
She said: "I am not going into other matters. That is not for this court."
