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Chapter 1: What is the main topic discussed in this episode?
That was probably very naive in the way in which I reported that. But I think that was the beginning of the kind of trust that came with the job. If you could meet sources and keep your mouth shut, that was a good sign from their point of view.
Chapter 2: Who was Jim Craig and what was his significance?
And so that's why I think I was accepted more readily on the Shankill Award.
I'm Nicola Tallent and this is Crime World, a podcast about criminals, drugs and the sins of the underworld. If you like this podcast and want to learn more about crime, go to our new website www.crimeworld.com for stories, extras and podcast subscriber specials.
Veteran journalist Chris Moore kept a secret intelligence document about the details of the murder of a prominent loyalist under lock and key for 30 years. Today, he joins me to discuss those details of why loyalists say they murdered their own man, Jim Craig, in 1988 after allegations that he colluded with his IRA enemies to extort money.
You're listening to Crime World, a podcast from sundayworld.com. Chris, welcome to the show and thanks very much for coming on. A story you'd written really caught my eye for a number of reasons and we're obviously going to let you tell it.
But in order to do so, we have to bring ourselves back 30 years to a very different Belfast and to a very different life you were leading because things were quite edgy there at that time working in journalism. Start by telling us, our listeners and our viewers, who Jim Craig is, because some in the South mightn't be as au fait with him.
Well, Jim Craig was a leading figure in the UDA. He was also associated very closely with the military wing of the UDA, if I can put it that way, the UFF. And he was... the kind of person who could be charismatic and very likeable. But on the other hand, he had this dark side and he could become very threatening. And there was good reason to feel threatened by him because he had a history of
of organising his men in such a way that they would tolerate his violence, if only to be disciplined about something they'd done to offend him. My experience with Jim Craig began when I worked in the newsletter paper and I patrolled the length and breadth of the Shankill Road meeting loyalists from the UFF through the UDA and also the UVF.
And Craig and one of the leaders of the UDA, a man called Tommy Little, quite often met me in bars on the Shankill Road. They would bring me up to speed with various events that were happening I don't have those notebooks any longer. I think they have got lost in a house move. But it was in the 70s. On occasions, I would meet them separately.
I mean, coming little, I would meet him in his house, not far from the Tennant Street RUC station. And I would meet Craig. as well independently, sometimes in the back room of bars on the Shankill.
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Chapter 3: What led to Jim Craig's murder by loyalists?
There's no debate like you have in the South when there's a political election. There's debate about bread and butter issues and You know, council taxes and water charges and all of those things that make up the body of politics. We didn't have that. We had orange and green, basically. It was all colour coded. And I never voted.
I had a belief in myself that if I don't vote for them, then I'm not contributing to them, which may be a silly way to do it, but anyway.
You know, it sounds strange, I'm sure to many, that you might be brought to a bar and be briefed by the head of a terror unit on one or other side of the divide. Nowadays, I suppose, often crime journalists are briefed by, you know, criminal bosses or somebody representing them. And that's the way it is. But I've always reckoned that actually politics is far dirtier. It's far murkier.
You know, those in the suits who are being paid, who are briefing, there's a little bit less clarity sometimes with that than there is coming from the criminal underworld where things are really pretty basic and pretty understandable mostly.
I agree with you, right? I had a little time for politicians and there were people who say to me, you know, How do you know when a politician's lying and his lips are moving? And that was the answer that the thing gives you. So I try not to be involved in politics. Obviously, I have to be aware of the politics. But here's what was happening at the time.
I mean, very early on in my career in the newsletter, I had two spells with them from 1971 to 1974. And then from 76 to 79. Now, in my first spell, UVF leader, Gusty Spence, was allowed out of prison where he was serving life. And he went to a relative's funeral. But he didn't go back because, you know, he was paroled or he was supposed to go back. I ended up
being taken to a room in the central and meeting him face to face so that he could give me his version of the way things were going.
And you're saying he didn't go back. In other words, he was on the run. Yes.
So it was a short enough meeting.
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Chapter 4: How did Chris Moore's relationship with loyalists influence his reporting?
I was quite surprised that I was allowed to see him at all. But I did a story. I have to say, right, I was so young that I was probably very naive in the way in which I reported that. But that was the beginning of, I think that was the beginning of the kind of trust that came with the job. If you could meet sources and keep your mouth shut, then that was a good sign from their point of view.
And so that's why I think I was accepted more readily on the Shankill Road.
So moving on then to Jim Craig and what happened, we're going to discuss a document that you've had all these years and that you have just revealed the details of. But tell us about your meeting with Craig and his subsequent murder, which was in the Late 1980s, I think.
Yeah, 1988. I had meetings with Craig and Tucker Little, Tommy Little, and they would brief me on UDA stuff in West Belfast. In South Belfast, I had another contact who is no longer living in Northern Ireland. but he was the UFF spokesman that I sought out when I wanted. Now, Craig could be nice enough. Yeah. I did see the ugly side of Craig.
When one day, when I was on the news desk, I think I was one of the three or four news editors in the newsroom, at the time, and I got a phone call from Craig to say, can I come up to a bar on the Shankill and meet with him? And I said, well, I'm stuck at the desk here. I can't really get away. They said, listen, this is important. I said, all right, okay. So I got a taxi.
I parked the taxi two streets away, wandered up to the bar, was shown into the back room, and And there was Craig sitting at the table. And he said, take a seat. There was a chair in front of it. And he then said to me, just to let you know, we're waiting for an explosion. We've planted a bomb in a van on the Shankill, or sorry, on the Falls Road. So we were close to the peace line.
And once he said that, I said, I made to stand up. I said, Jim, I'm not sitting here waiting for that to happen. And it turns around and there were two young tartan guys behind me on either side of the door that I had just come in from the bar. And one of them pulled a weapon and said, you just sit down. Wait, Jim says.
So after waiting for a few minutes with an ugly silence, the other young man was sent off by Jim to find out what had happened and why the explosion hadn't occurred. And he came back and reported that the detonator had gone off, that the explosives hadn't. And the explosives were in... One of the vans that we used to see regularly in Belfast at that time, it was Michael Hager's glass van.
They would have replaced windows in shops or offices. And that's where the bomb was. They were hoping that that bomb would go off and hurt members of the public who were nearby.
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