Level of damages paid to bartender who survived loyalist gun attack on pub to be cut in half

​Senior judges halved the original £10,000 award made to John McEvoy based on a reduced period of culpable delay in probing the shootings at the Thierafurth Inn in Kilcoo, Co Down more than 30 years ago.

But Lady Chief Justice Dame Siobhan Keegan stated that the PSNI cannot be “absolved” of all liability.

She held: “Damages should be awarded to reflect the distress and anxiety occasioned from the delay in investigating this case over a one-two year period.”

In November 1992 a UVF gang opened fire during a darts tournament in the pub, killing 42-year-old customer Peter McCormack and seriously wounding three others. Mr McEvoy was on duty in the bar and suffered post-traumatic stress disorder.

He challenged the PSNI’s alleged failure to properly examine circumstances surrounding the gun attack.

In October last year the High Court found police were in breach of a legal duty to carry out an effective probe within a reasonable time.

A judge held that new material in a watchdog report and a documentary film which named suspects represented plausible evidence of significant state collusion.

At that stage Mr McEvoy was awarded £10,000 compensation for failures to ensure a prompt investigation in violation of the European Convention on Human Rights.

Lawyers for the Chief Constable appealed, arguing that damages were not necessary and that the level of payout was excessive.

The case is centred on information about suspected collusion between members of the security forces and the UVF operating in the south Down area at that time.

It followed the publication in 2016 of a Police Ombudsman report into the Loughinisland massacre.

In that attack loyalist gunmen murdered six Catholic men watching a World Cup football match in June 1994.

A film on the Loughinisland killings which premiered in 2017, No Stone Unturned, named suspects and strengthened the case for a fully independent probe, it was contended.

One of those referred to in the documentary as Person A was allegedly linked to the Thierafurth Inn attack.

Even though the PSNI’s Legacy Investigation Branch (LIB) is to re-examine the circumstances surrounding the shootings, Mr McEvoy’s lawyers claimed there will be an unlawful delay of several years.

The High Court found that the new material has been in the public domain for up to six years without prompting any action by the state.

But counsel for the Chief Constable mounted a fresh point on appeal that the PSNI was prevented from taking investigative steps between 2018 and 2022 because legacy litigation had been put on hold.

At that stage the Supreme Court reversed previous findings that the force lacked sufficient independence.

Ruling on the appeal, Dame Siobhan held that there was still no justification for a period after the Ombudsman report and documentary film.

“We must take 2018 as a threshold as it was then that the case was stayed along with others dealing with PSNI independence,” she said.

“The trial judge was not directed to these issues, and we feel if he had been he would have awarded compensation for a reduced period on a reduced basis.”

The Chief Justice confirmed: “With the benefit of the improved submissions we have received, we assess the extent of damages at £5,000.”

Meanwhile, Mr McEvoy is pressing ahead with a separate civil action over the scale of alleged collusion in the attack