Thirty-Two Years And No Conviction: The Murder of Rosanne Mallon
Part I
Roseanne Mallon was a lovely person. She was a retiree, unmarried, who lived with her sister-in-law Bridget Mallon. Brigid’s adult children, Paula, Alice, Ann, and Martin, all lived beside each other in Killmoyle, Dungannon, County Tyrone.
Christopher lived with his mother Brigid. Paula lived opposite her mom and her house overlooked her mom’s house.
Roseanne was not a political person, nor was she involved in any paramilitary activity. She was simply a 76-year-old woman who loved sharing time with her family.
Her life came to an appalling end on the evening of Saturday, May 8, 1994, when their home was attacked. On that evening, a volley of automatic gunfire was launched through the window of the home, killing Roseanne as she was watching television. Thirty-two years on, no one has been charged, indicted, or convicted in her murder.
A Prelude to Murder
In 1993, Martin Mallon, Roseanne’s nephew, was released from Long Kesh after serving a seven-year sentence for possession of explosives. After his release he worked with others toward a political solution to the Troubles. In 1994, he became chair of Sinn Féin in County Tyrone. This growing movement toward a political solution eventually helped bring about the Provisional IRA’s 1994 ceasefire.
Sometime in 1994, before Roseanne’s murder took place, Martin Mallon was arrested and taken to an RUC Barracks. He was likely targeted because of his involvement with the Provisional IRA.
During our interview, Mr. Mallon recounted that, “[he] was locked up overnight and interrogated the next morning. I didn’t have my solicitor. A well-dressed Englishmen entered the room. He said he was there to negotiate with me on behalf of MI5. He told me that I didn’t have to say anything, I could wink or nod to show if I agree [with an offer]. He went on to tell me that I would make a good candidate for [elected] office; and I would be protected and so would my family. After he said that I didn’t blink or move. When he saw that I didn’t agree to his offer, he said that ‘at their time and convenience a member of your family will be executed’. When he stood up to leave he made the offer again and I didn’t react. He then said a member of my family would be killed.”
This would not be the final time Mr. Mallon and his family would be threatened.
Three weeks prior to Roseanne’s murder, Mr. Mallon was stopped on an isolated road by armed Special Branch officers and held there for almost one hour at the roadside. During the detention, Mr. Mallon recounted, “after I was stopped, I was asked where I was coming from. I said Dungannon. They got me out of the car and searched [the car]. After the search, I asked if I was under arrest. They said no, but I had to wait here for a while. After some time Billy Wright and Tony McNeill pull up in a car and talked with the officers”.
[For context, Billy Wright was the founder and leader of the Loyalist Volunteer Force (the “LVF”) and was a ruthless figure during the Troubles. He founded the LVF in 1996, following his expulsion from the Ulster Volunteer Force (the UVF”). Billy Wright was also an alleged a “agent’ for the Special Branch.
He also carried the nickname “King Rat,” given to him by the media because of his notorious murders.
Tony McNeill was a close associate of Billy Wright and carried out murders as a member of the UVF and later the LVF.]“When Billy and Tony got there, the police ID me to both of them saying, ‘that’s Martin Mallon sitting in the car.’ They [Billy Wright and Tony McNeill] shouted insults and things I won’t repeat here. Wright and McNeill drove up next to my car and said they would kill me and my wife. It was clear that the situation shifted from being about me to being about getting my family”.
It was reported that, as a lead up to Roseanne’s murder, RUC Special Branch members issued death threats three weeks before the murder threatening to kill Mr. Mallon’s wife. Mr. Mallon and his brother Christy were regularly subjected to threats from the RUC. Like Martin, Christy was also a former IRA political prisoner, having served time in Long Kesh.
The Murder – May 8, 1994
On Saturday night, May 8th, Roseanne and her sister-in-law, Brigid Mallon, had been out together and returned home by car around 10:30 p.m. Roseanne sat down on the couch (the “settee”) in the living room at the rear of the house with her back to the window. The lights were on in the living room, and the blinds were drawn partially.
Bridgid left the room to telephone her daughter, Paula, who lived with her husband and family on the other side of the road. Paula’s home had a view looking at her mom’s home.
Roseann Mallon
As Brigid and her daughter Paula were talking on the telephone, Paula noticed a large passenger sedan (a “saloon car”), dark in color, stopping at the entrance to Brigid’s home and two men running up the driveway towards the house. Paula told her mother to see what was happening and to get to a safe place.
Brigid put the telephone down but left the line connected while she went into the living room. Brigid, in an audible whisper to Roseanne, and signaling with her hands, told her to get out of the room. Roseanne began to get up, but her arthritic condition made it slow to get up.
Brigid had by then gone back into the hall when she heard a volley of gunfire and the room filled with smoke. She heard Roseanne say “oh dear.” Brigid heard a car drive off with its wheels spinning.
Despite her age of 60, being shot in the hand, and with shrapnel wounds to her leg, she went back to the living room and went over to where Roseanne was laying. Roseanne gave a couple of sighs as Brigid watched the color drain from her face.
Brigid called out to her daughter who was still on the telephone. Paula, who had heard the gunfire over the open telephone line, made two 999 calls to the police just before midnight. An ambulance arrived at around 12:13a.m.
Upon arriving, the responders could find no signs of life. They remained with Roseanne’s body until her doctor arrived and pronounced death on May 8th, at 12:40 a.m.
The pathology report determined that “Death was due to bullet wounds of the trunk. Numerous bullet fragments, including the steel cores of bullets, had struck the back of the body and passed forwards. Some had made their exits on the front, whilst others had lodged in the body.
They had fractured two right and two left ribs as well as severely lacerating the lower part of the right lung and lacerating the intestines and the aorta in the abdomen. The combined effect of these injuries would have caused her rapid death.
Other fragments had also struck the head and limbs … The injuries were of a type caused by bullets of high velocity.”
The weapon used to kill Roseanne Mallon was a fully automatic VZ58 assault rifle, similar to an AK-47, located on May 14th that year, hidden under a piece of corrugated metal at a derelict house not far from the murder scene. A report by the former Historical Enquiries Team alleges that British intelligence agents were involved in the plot or knew of the shipment that brought the VZ58 to Northern Ireland used to kill Roseanne Mallon, and that members of the military were believed to have been involved in several of the later killings in which the weapon was used.
In next months “A Legal Look,”,the collusion and cover-up by British authorities of Roseanne Mallon’s murder and the contradictions in the Coroners Verdict.
