MOMENT OF TRUTH (NO STONE UNTURNED)

“Investigative journalism has been relegated to a very, very tiny space in America,” the attorney and environmental campaigner Robert F Kennedy Jr observed.

“We don’t really have much investigative journalism left. And the last refuge for it is documentary filmmaking.”

Alex Gibney has been one of the most effective flag wavers for investigative reporting in the US in recent years.

The New Yorker, who in 2007 captured the Oscar for Best Documentary Feature for ‘Taxi to the Dark Side’ about the beating to death fof a taxi driver in Afghanistan by US soldiers, has carved out a reputation as a fearless documentary filmmaker.

He has tackled subjects as varied as Enron, the child abuse scandals in the Catholic Church, Scientology and the doping scandal in cycling epitomised by Lance Armstrong.

In recent years, he has also collaborated with the Belfast-based journalist Trevor Birney and his colleagues at Below the Radar and Fine Point Films.

Birney and his team co-produced Gibney’s 2012 documentary about child abuse in the Catholic Church, ‘Mea Maxima Culpa: Silence In the House of God’ and ‘Ceasefire Massacre’, an episode of ESPN’s ‘30 for 30: Soccer Stories’ series.
     
It is the latter which inspired another collaboration which in recent days has again hit the headlines, the 2017 documentary ‘No Stone Unturned’.

‘Ceasefire Massacre’ was a 24 minute film centred around one of the greatest days in the history of Irish sport which soon turned into one of the darkest days of Northern Ireland’s Troubles.

Featuring interviews with players, journalists and politicians, it marked the Republic of Ireland soccer team’s sensational 1-0 victory over the Italians at the USA 94 World Cup in the Giants Stadium in New Jersey.

But it also focussed on the gunning down in Northern Ireland by loyalist paramilitaries of six people who were watching the game on a television in the Heights Bar in the Co Down village of Loughinisland. Five other people were wounded.

The ESPN film scratched the surface of the controversy that has surrounded the atrocity which was carried out by the Ulster Volunteer Force.

Out of that ESPN short ‘No Stone Unturned’ was born, taking its title from a phrase uttered by Clare Rogan, whose husband Adrian was among the six victims.

Recalling how police had vowed at her husband’s wake to ensure no stone would be left unturned in their efforts to catch the UVF gang, a disillusioned Mrs Rogan told Gibney she believed no stone was lifted in the investigation, let alone was turned.

Gibney’s 2017 feature delves deeper into the killings while using some interview footage from the original ESPN film.

But he also draws on Belfast journalist Barry McCaffrey’s investigations into why the police investigation failed to result in any prosecutions.
 
Charting the Loughinisland families’  efforts to get to the bottom of who targeted the Heights Bar and why they have never received justice, it begins sombrely with a reconstruction of the events of June 18, 1994. With an eye to international and younger audiences with little knowledge or understanding of Northern Ireland’s Troubles, Gibney then launches into a quick history lesson.

But it is when he gets into the nitty gritty of the Loughinisland attack and, in particular, a series of spectacular failures in the Royal Ulster Constabulary investigation that ‘No Stone Unturned’ starts to take on the air of a gripping crime documentary.

Specifically, the destruction of a car containing a wealth of forensic evidence, the bizarre interrogation of suspects and the disappearance of interview notes immediately play into strong concerns that other forces were at play.

These naturally lead Gibney and the journalists featured in the film to the conclusion that collusion between members of the RUC and the loyalist gang thwarted the investigation and the priority was to protect a prized informer.

The film is scathing of the original Northern Ireland Police Ombudsman investigation into the atrocity in 2011 which found no evidence of collusion.

But it also features prominently the subsequent efforts by the current Police Ombudsman Michael Maguire and his investigative team to put that right.

In 2016, the Police Ombudsman concluded there was evidence of collusion with the loyalist gang.

With the Ombudsman’s team reluctant to name in the report the killers responsible, the big revelation in Gibney’s film is a leaked document from an earlier Ombudsman probe that enabled McCaffrey and the director to identify those responsible.

They also reveal a letter was received by a local politician from an individual close to the gang expressing remorse and revealing who was responsible.

‘No Stone Unturned’ hit the headlines again over the past few days after police raided the office of Fine Point Films in Belfast on August 31 and questioned Barry McCaffrey and Trevor Birney about allegations that the Ombudsman document featured in the film was stolen.

The journalistic community in Northern Ireland have rallied around the two men, citing the arrests are an attack on the profession.

The Loughinisland relatives and some politicians have also queried the arrests and Gibney has expressed his shock.

The arrests have renewed interest in Gibney’s film, which got a theatrical release in Northern Ireland and the Irish Republic but a more limited release in Britain confined largely to streaming services.

As a piece of factual storytelling, ‘No Stone Unturned’ is the kind of compelling and informative documentary audiences have come to expect from Gibney.

Beautifully shot by Stan Harlow and Ross McDonell who capture the lushness of the Co Down countryside and wonderfully edited by Andy Grieve and Alexis Johnson, Gibney’s film shines a light on a conflict where morality was severely and regularly compromised.

The Loughinisland massacre is not treated in isolation but rather in the overall context of a dirty war where informers operating within republican and loyalist paramilitary groups were allowed to kill innocent people while the authorities turned a blind eye to their deeds.

The documentary specifically references the case of Freddie Scappaticci, an IRA member who interrogated informers for the organisation and was later alleged to have provided information to British military intelligence.

In its dogged pursuit of the truth, ‘No Stone Unturned’ underscores how the loss of a moral compass led to the needless loss of many lives and to shameful attempts to frustrate justice.

But it also rams home the huge price paid by all victims and survivors of the Troubles, as Northern Ireland has tried to extricate itself from the legacy of a very nasty conflict.

In the 20 years that have elapsed since the signing of the Good Friday Agreement, an agreed mechanism for victims and survivors that all sides can sign up to has yet to surface.

The film reaffirms the belief that while the suffering of all victims’ families is overlooked and a way of addressing their need for truth remains elusive, the horrors of Northern Ireland’s past will continue to dog the present.

Northern Ireland will never be able to fully blossom as a society without some formal method of acknowledging the pain borne by victims and survivors, the need for honesty and genuine reconciliation.

Twenty four years on from the IRA and loyalist paramilitaries’ ceasefires, Gibney’s film conveys the fear that grips relatives of all victims of violence who have either had to deal with the Good Friday Agreement’s early prisoner releases or no-one ever being charged for the murder of their loved ones.

One relative in Loughinisland dreads running into one of the killers on the street, knowing that that individual escaped prosecution and has uttered no words of regret for their vile act.

‘No Stone Unturned’ should be a wake up call to all parties to the 25 year conflict in Northern Ireland that they need to be open and honest about the violence that erupted.

Otherwise the sins of the past will continue to pollute the peaceful society the people of Northern Ireland crave.

Gibney’s film shows Northern Ireland and everyone involved in the conflict really is facing a moment of truth.

(‘No Stone Unturned’ was released in cinemas in Northern Ireland and the Irish Republic on November 10, 2017 and on streaming services such as Amazon Prime on January 10, 2018)