Clegg promoted to corporal

Paratrooper Lee Clegg - whose final conviction over the deaths of two Belfast car thieves was finally quashed earlier this year…

Paratrooper Lee Clegg - whose final conviction over the deaths of two Belfast car thieves was finally quashed earlier this year - has been promoted to corporal. The new job comes with a pay rise of several thousand pounds a year.

Cpl Clegg fired at a stolen car as it burst through a checkpoint in Belfast in September 1990, saying he feared a terrorist attack. He was jailed for life in 1993 for murdering passenger Karen Reilly (18) and wounding the driver, Martin Peake (17), who also died.

He was freed on licence two years later and in March last year was cleared of the murder at a retrial. The wounding conviction was quashed this January.

A British Ministry of Defence spokesman said yesterday: "He was promoted to corporal this month. Cpl Clegg has resumed his military career and will be treated equally with his peers. This is a normal career progression for which Cpl Clegg is qualified."