The Belfast Project was an

oral history Oral history is the collection and study of historical information from people, families, important events, or everyday life using audiotapes, videotapes, or transcriptions of planned interviews. These interviews are conducted with people who pa ...

project on

the Troubles The Troubles () were an ethno-nationalist conflict in Northern Ireland that lasted for about 30 years from the late 1960s to 1998. Also known internationally as the Northern Ireland conflict, it began in the late 1960s and is usually deemed t ...

based at

Boston College Boston College (BC) is a private university, private Catholic Jesuits, Jesuit research university in Chestnut Hill, Massachusetts, United States. Founded in 1863 by the Society of Jesus, a Catholic Religious order (Catholic), religious order, t ...

Massachusetts Massachusetts ( ; ), officially the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, is a U.S. state, state in the New England region of the Northeastern United States. It borders the Atlantic Ocean and the Gulf of Maine to its east, Connecticut and Rhode ...

, U.S. The project began in 2000, and the last interviews were concluded in 2006.Stackpole, Thoma
How an Oral History Project Got the Head of Sinn Fein Arrested
. ''Foreign Policy''. May 2, 2014. The interviews were intended to be released after the participants' deathsGillespie, Gordon.
Historical Dictionary of the Northern Ireland Conflict
'. Rowman & Littlefield Publishers. 2017. and serve as a resource for future historians.

Ed Moloney Edmund "Ed" Moloney (born 1948/49) is an Irish journalist and author best known for his coverage of the Troubles in Northern Ireland, and the activities of the Provisional IRA, in particular. He worked for the ''Hibernia'' magazine and ''Magill ...

was the project's director.Boston tapes: Q&A on secret Troubles confessions
. ''BBC''. 7 October 2019. Former IRA prisoner turned academic

Anthony McIntyre Anthony McIntyre (born 27 June 1957) is a former Provisional Irish Republican Army (IRA) volunteer, writer and historian. Early life and career On 27 February 1976, the IRA targeted Victor’s Bar in Belfast, identifying its doorman Kenneth Le ...

conducted interviews with

Irish republican Irish republicanism () is the political movement for an Irish republic, void of any British rule. Throughout its centuries of existence, it has encompassed various tactics and identities, simultaneously elective and militant and has been both w ...

paramilitary A paramilitary is a military that is not a part of a country's official or legitimate armed forces. The Oxford English Dictionary traces the use of the term "paramilitary" as far back as 1934. Overview Though a paramilitary is, by definiti ...

members (including

Brendan Hughes Brendan Hughes (June 1948 – 16 February 2008) was a leading Irish republican and former Officer Commanding (OC) of the Belfast Brigade of the Provisional Irish Republican Army (IRA). His reputation with the republican cause would lead to nic ...

Dolours Price Dolours Price (16 December 1950 – 23 January 2013) was a Provisional Irish Republican Army (IRA) volunteer. She grew up in an Irish republican family and joined the IRA in 1971. She was sent to jail for her role in the 1973 Old Bailey bombin ...

, Ivor Bell, and Richard O'Rawe), while Wilson McArthur, East Belfast resident with strong loyalist ties, conducted interviews with

loyalist Loyalism, in the United Kingdom, its overseas territories and its former colonies, refers to the allegiance to the British crown or the United Kingdom. In North America, the most common usage of the term refers to loyalty to the British Cr ...

paramilitary members. The two interviewed more than 40 people. Interviews with Hughes and David Ervine were used (after their deaths) as the basis for Moloney's 2010 book ''Voices From The Grave: Two Men's War in Ireland'', drawing attention to the archive. Subsequently, interviews dealing with the

murder of Jean McConville Jean McConville (''née'' Murray; 7 May 1934 – 1 December 1972) was a woman from Belfast, Northern Ireland, who was kidnapped and murdered by the Provisional Irish Republican Army (IRA) and secretly buried in County Louth in the Republic of Ire ...

, one of " Disappeared" of Northern Ireland, were subpoenaed by the

Police Service of Northern Ireland The Police Service of Northern Ireland (PSNI; ; Ulster-Scots: '), is the police service responsible for law enforcement and the prevention of crime within Northern Ireland. It is the successor to the Royal Ulster Constabulary (RUC) after it ...

(PSNI). Moloney and McIntyre filed a lawsuit seeking to block this request, arguing that it placed project participants at risk. The

ACLU The American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) is an American nonprofit civil rights organization founded in 1920. ACLU affiliates are active in all 50 states, Washington, D.C., and Puerto Rico. The budget of the ACLU in 2024 was $383 million. ...

filed a supporting brief. However, the PSNI ultimately won the resulting court battle, with a United States appeals court decision stating, "The choice to investigate criminal activity belongs to the government and is not subject to veto by academic researchers." Transcripts of interviews with both Price and Hughes were ultimately given to the PSNI. In 2014, these interviews were used to charge Ivor Bell with soliciting McConville's murder. Portions of the tapes were played in public for the first time during the court proceedings. Ultimately Bell was

acquitted In common law jurisdictions, an acquittal means that the criminal prosecution has failed to prove that the accused is guilty beyond a reasonable doubt of the charge presented. It certifies that the accused is free from the charge of an o ...

as the court found the tapes to be unreliable and they were not admitted as evidence. These tapes are also thought to have contributed to

Gerry Adams Gerard Adams (; born 6 October 1948) is a retired Irish Republican politician who was the president of Sinn Féin between 13 November 1983 and 10 February 2018, and served as a Teachta Dála (TD) for Louth from 2011 to 2020. From 1983 to 19 ...

's 2014 arrest, in which no charges were ultimately filed. The project's interviews with the loyalist Winston Churchill Rea were in 2015 also subpoenaed by the PSNI and used to prosecute him for murder and other crimes in 2016. Rea's trial was delayed repeatedly due to his failing health and the

coronavirus pandemic The COVID-19 pandemic (also known as the coronavirus pandemic and COVID pandemic), caused by severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2), began with an disease outbreak, outbreak of COVID-19 in Wuhan, China, in December ...

. He died in 2023, before the trial could be concluded. Boston College announced via a student publication in 2014 that it was ending the project, returning tapes to living participants upon request. Interviewer Anthony McIntyre had himself contributed a recorded interview to the Belfast Project, which were also subsequently subpoenaed by the PSNI in 2018; in April 2024, the courts ultimately ruled in favor of the PSNI accessing the tapes, only five days before the cut-off date of May 1, 2024 set by the Troubles Legacy Act, after which point all active historical investigations and no further inquests into Troubles-era crimes can be launched.

References

{{reflist

External links

The Belfast Project, Boston College, and a Sealed Subpoena
Blog devoted to the court case, with many court documents Oral history The Troubles (Northern Ireland) Boston College