Background:To the dispassionate onlooker, the Omagh trial appeared to have everything.
The case was marked by dramatic exchanges between an eminent defence counsel and the judge, claims and counter-claims about new forensic techniques and testimony from a former FBI spy. It also included astonishing allegations about some police conduct and the possible contamination or even alteration of evidence.
For all the drama though, it failed to deliver for the Omagh relatives the sound conviction they crave or to offer them a sense of closure after the worst single bombing incident of the Troubles as its 10th anniversary approaches.
For them, the wait must continue to see someone sentenced for the murders of 29 children, men and women - one of them pregnant with twins - on a Co Tyrone street in August 1998, just months after the euphoria of the Belfast Agreement breakthrough.
Relatives of the victims will understandably view the judge's findings in terms of their own personal tragedy. The implications of the case though will be felt in jurisdictions around the globe.
Also on trial throughout Sean Hoey's 56 days in court was the standing of so-called "low copy number DNA" - a relatively new and controversial forensic process which allows DNA profiling from infinitesimally small samples. The rejection by Belfast Crown Court of evidence based upon it will resonate.
Last January Mr Justice Weir retired to consider his verdict in the case of the 37-year-old south Armagh man accused in connection with the bombing. He told the non-jury Diplock court that much of the material presented to the court would need to be examined again, but he promised he would return with his findings as soon as possible. Eleven months later he did just that.
At the centre of the case against the defendant, the judge said yesterday, were three main "strands" of evidence.
These related to claims that there was a degree of common "authorship" of the timing and power devices used in the Omagh bomb and in devices used elsewhere in Northern Ireland in the run-up to August 1998.
The second strand related to the discovery of fibres at the various scenes of crime and the attempt to link these to Hoey and to materials found at his Co Armagh home.
The third strand was the DNA evidence; it is possible that it was consideration of this that caused the judge to take some 11 months to arrive at his verdict.
A key portion of the prosecution case against Hoey was founded on DNA profiling, gleaned from minute samples, presented in court. Some molecules, the court heard, were as small as a millionth part of a grain of salt.
No international standards had yet been applied to it, the judge told the court, and there was understood to be disagreement among its proponents. Its use in the Omagh case was subject to a sustained attack by the defence.
The judge had to consider whether such evidence amounted to a reliable connection between the defendant and evidence gleaned from the devastated centre of Omagh.
On this count alone, the Omagh case is tremendously significant. However, the drama surrounding the Hoey trial was not limited to the main thrust of the prosecution case against him.
Leading the defence attack on the forensic evidence was Orlando Pownall QC, said to be a particularly gifted lawyer whose calm court performance tends to mask his gravitas. Exchanges between the judge and Mr Pownall also provided key moments of courtroom drama.
"Do not waste time trying to impress a jury when there isn't one," the judge remarked to Mr Pownall pointedly. On another occasion he advised him to "adapt to his ways" rather than have the judge do the yielding.
The early days of the trial saw a British army witness concede in court that some evidence may have been "forensically altered".
Questioned about an attempted bombing months before Omagh of which Hoey was also accused, the court was told black tape, seen in pictures of the device when it was examined at a forensics laboratory, was not present when the device was recovered from the scene.
Another officer said that items recovered at the time were suitable for DNA analysis. However, he admitted that the manner of handling and storing used at the time was open to the possibility of contamination.
Days later, another scene-of-crime officer told the court that evidence linked to another bombing of which Hoey was accused appeared to have been altered.
This officer admitted that the label on an item linked to a car-bomb attack in Armagh in May 1998 appeared to have had the date changed.
The following day, the court heard that evidence relating to yet another attack, this time in Newry just a month before Omagh, was stored in a manner which was "a complete mess". Locating items was like searching for the proverbial needle in a haystack, the officer said.
These claims were later denied, but a police exhibits officer did tell the court that the records of the evidence were "lacking".
The court also heard that a detonator being used in evidence had been discovered by a forensic scientist five years after it was thought to have been destroyed.
Later, evidence was presented which the prosecution tried to use to link the defendant to other bombings. A prosecution witness drew parallels between electrical work on the Omagh device and devices used in other bombings. However, Mr Pownall dismissed his opinions as "guesswork".
The judge later ruled that the scientist not be allowed to give an expert opinion. The same witness later conceded that Hoey's DNA could have been transferred on to evidence as adequate protection measures to guard against this were not taken.
Also considered during the trial were claims by an FBI spy who had infiltrated the dissident republican circles believed responsible for the bombing as well as a host of other attacks.
The court heard he had compiled some 2,000 pages of reports on these groups in which he named about 100 people. However, the FBI reports did not refer to Hoey even though there were references to the bombing of Omagh.
Yesterday's verdict emphatically cleared Hoey. For the Omagh relatives, the police, British army and forensic services as well as the international scientific community, many clear and pertinent questions remain glaringly unanswered.