Two men who died in the IRA bomb at Canary Wharf nearly two years ago were blown through two walls by the force of the explosion, an Old Bailey jury heard yesterday. The bomb brought an end to an 18-month ceasefire and it was only after a "meticulous investigation" that two men were arrested.
"An inaccurate and wholly inadequate warning" had been given about the explosion, which took place at 6.59 p.m. on Friday February 9th, 1996, prosecuting counsel Mr John Bevan QC said.
The two men who died, newsagent Inam Bashir (29) and his assistant, John Jeffries (31), had just been told to leave their shop by a police officer, PC Roger Degraff, but possibly did not take his warning seriously enough and were killed instantly.
Mr James McCardle (30) denies murdering both men. He and Mr Patrick McKinley (34) both deny conspiring to cause explosions.
Finger, thumb and palm prints linked Mr McCardle "inextricably" to the conspiracy, but the evidence against Mr McKinley, who was at home in south Armagh at the time of the explosion, was not clear-cut. "The IRA go to great lengths to cover their tracks," he said.
The newsagent's shop, News Stop 2000, was at the centre of the blast from several tons of homemade explosive which had been hidden on a lorry parked at South Quay near Canary Wharf earlier in the day. The case continues.