The most senior loyalist paramilitary to become a so-called supergrass is to be the key prosecution witness in the trial of a man charged with the murders of two Catholics by the UVF in Belfast city centre in May 1994.
Father-of-six Eamon Fox, 41, and Gary Convie, a 24-year-old father-of-one, were shot dead while eating their lunch in a car beside a building site where they worked in a loyalist area of the city.
They were killed when a gunman fired at least 15 shots from a machinegun through railings in a children's playground. A third person in the car escaped uninjured.
James Stewart Smyth, 57, from Forthriver Link in north Belfast, appeared at Belfast Crown Court today charged with the murders.
He is also charged with the attempted murder of the third man in the car, possession of a machinegun and ammunition with intent to endanger life and membership of the UVF.
The first day of the non-jury trial was told that the evidence includes statements by former UVF commander Gary Haggarty, forensics, and statements by a number of eyewitnesses.
Six years ago, Haggarty pleaded guilty to 200 charges, including involvement in the murders.
He also admitted three other murders, five attempted murders, and 23 conspiracies to murder.
However, he was given a reduced sentence in return for agreeing to become an assisting offender, a so-called supergrass, and to give evidence against his former colleagues in the UVF.
At the time, his trial judge told Haggarty he would normally have been sent to prison for 35 years, but he was sentenced to just six-and-a-half years because of his offer to provide assistance.
He was given a new secret identity, lives at a secret address outside Northern Ireland and is under the supervision of the British security service MI5.
The court was told today that Haggarty was working as an agent for RUC Special Branch at the time of the shooting.
He was involved in supplying and testing the Sten gun used, attended a meeting where the plan for the attack was discussed and led the defendant to the firing point.
A prosecution lawyer said Haggarty met Mr Smyth after the shooting and he been "excited, hyper and really pleased" about what he had done, telling him he had fired the gun "until it was empty" and had stumbled as he ran from the scene.
The court also heard that afterwards Haggarty told his Special Branch handlers where to find the weapon used and who had been involved.
Haggarty is due to give evidence in the third week of the trial.
The PPS said that while it accepts that Haggarty was a "serious, serial offender", it believed his account of what happened is "reliable and credible".
"The fact that he was a multi-murderer who committed a catalogue of other offences does not in itself mean that he is incapable of providing a truthful account about the involvement of Jimmy Smyth in the Convie and Fox murders, which he was also involved in," said Ciaran Murphy KC.
He said the combination of evidence from the former UVF commander, eyewitnesses and forensics would lead to "the inevitable conclusion that Gary Haggarty's account is truthful".
The court was told that when interviewed by police, Mr Smyth had denied any knowledge about the shooting and said he "definitely wasn't guilty".
The prosecution lawyer said Haggarty's identification of Mr Smyth as the gunman would be corroborated by a number of eyewitnesses.
Relatives of the two victims were in court and a number of others listened via video link as statements from a number of those witnesses were read.
Two said they saw a man dressed in dark clothing running from the scene with a "long gun" in his hand and that at one point he stopped and shouted, "Up the UVF".
A number of witnesses said the gunman had stumbled as he ran.
There was also a statement from the third person in the car, a relative of the two victims who is being referred to as Witness A.
The prosecution lawyer said the evidence would show that Mr Smyth had "mown down two totally innocent men in broad daylight" while they were simply going about their work "in the name of the UVF and naked sectarianism".
The trial continues.
