THE BLOODY SUNDAY INQUIRY: A police witness told the inquiry yesterday that, while at a holding centre on Bloody Sunday, he saw a paratrooper make an unprovoked assault on a detained civilian. However, several other serving or former RUC officers said they did not witness ill-treatment of prisoners. All gave evidence from behind screens.
Mr James P O'Neill, who was a constable in Derry on January 30th, 1972, said he was at the Fort George army base to deal with any prisoners brought in. He watched prisoners being "herded off the lorries in a fairly rough-and-ready manner", some of them in a distressed state.
He recalled at least five army Alsatian dogs being present, barking continuously, and held by handlers "so that they could come very close to the prisoners without actually making contact with them".
The witness said he did not remember any systematic beating, but the paratroopers "all seemed to be very hyped up". After a small ginger-haired man got out of the lorry, the witness said, "a young Para struck him in the groin/privates with the butt of a rifle and he fell to his knees."
Mr O'Neill, questioned by Mr Barry MacDonald, for the victims' families, agreed the paratroopers "were running the show on that particular day".
Asked if the soldiers were actually above the law in the sense that they could commit acts of assault with impunity, the witness replied: "Well, yes".
Another witness, Mr Alexander Gray, said he was an RUC sergeant at the time and was at Fort George, but did not witness any ill-treatment of detainees.
Questioned by counsel, he agreed that between 15 to 20 detainees had injuries, but he did not know how they had come by these.