A man who bled to death after being shot in a punishment attack in Belfast early yesterday was killed because of a personal vendetta by republican elements, according to his family. Police say the man was "totally innocent" and had no links to drug-dealing or paramilitaries.
Mr Andy Kearney (33), a father of four young girls, was with his girlfriend and two-week-old daughter in a flat in the New Lodge in north Belfast when the attack occurred shortly after midnight.
Five men burst into the eighth-floor flat in Fianna House in the strongly republican area and ordered Mr Kearney's girlfriend to take the infant into a bedroom. He was then led out of the flat into a lift where he was shot three times, once behind each knee and once in the ankle.
Before fleeing, his attackers ripped out the phone in the flat. Neighbours yesterday told how Mr Kearney's girlfriend, Ms Lisa Darragh (25), ran with the baby to a friend's flat in a nearby towerblock, where an ambulance was called. One neighbour found Mr Kearney lying in a pool of blood in the lift. It is believed he died because of this delay in calling an ambulance. He was taken to the nearby Mater hospital but could not be saved. An artery in his leg was severed.
Mr Kearney was from Twinbrook in west Belfast, where he was living until a year ago when he separated from his wife. He had three daughters from his marriage, aged seven, four and three.
His mother, Ms Maureen Kearney (65), said yesterday he received threats over the past year, which she believed were linked to fights in which he had been involved. One threat, sent in a note to his ex-wife's house, came from Direct Action Against Drugs, widely regarded as a cover name for the IRA.
When asked whom she believed had carried out the attack, Ms Kearney replied: "People who are carrying out personal vendettas, who claim to be Provos. If they don't like you, they dispense with you, and he was dispensed with."
She was a republican all her life and had gone to senior Sinn Fein and IRA people. "They assured me that it [the threat] wasn't from them. I defy them to come today. He knew he would be shot. He was always looking over his shoulder." Her son was "a hot-head" and known as "a bit of a fighter". He is believed to have been involved in a fight in a west Belfast bar some weeks ago when a prominent republican was beaten up.
Mrs Kearney broke down as she held her son's two-week-old daughter, Caitlin, her 17th grandchild. She said she could not forgive her son's killers. "God forgive me, but I hate them. I never thought I'd say that." Mrs Kearney suffered an angina attack and was taken to hospital when she was told of the shooting. Supt Roger Maxwell, who is leading the investigation, said the attack bore all the hallmarks of a paramilitary-style shooting and he believed republicans were to blame.
Mr Glyn Roberts of the pressure group, Families Against Intimidation and Terror, said the at tack bore the hallmarks of the IRA. "If this is the case, then major questions have to be asked about Sinn Fein's participation in the Assembly executive. Plainly no party can expect to be in government while their paramilitary wing engage in this type of barbarism."