State Violence by Raymond Murray Page B

thinking all types of thoughts. After a few more hours of that I was thinking I would never come out of it.

More Interrogations
    A few more interrogations, about twelve to fifteen hours in between. Something similar the whole time. After what seemed a few more days to me, I couldn’t stand at all. Must have been collapsing and falling all the time. One time I felt somebody lifted my leg and a sharp needle was run along my foot. I was up against the wall again after that. By this time the noise, which was there all the time, was such that it is just impossible to explain; you couldn’t have sensible thoughts. I had come out of the helicopter listening to see were we going to the same place and when I heard the noise it just knocked the heart out of you.
    After one of the interrogations I was brought into this small room. No noise there. It was completely black. I took the hood off after a few minutes. The room seemed very small, about six feet by four feet. I was exhausted. I rolled the hood up, made a pillow. It was a concrete floor, freezing out. But I was totally exhausted and I slept. That was the first sleep I got. I had never been offered any sleep.
    I got only half a cup of water, only once, and it seemed after days. My lips were all dried up. They tried to put bread in my mouth, couldn’t take it, just choked me. That was the first and only water I got. They had given it to me sitting on the ground after I had fallen.

SAS
    One time I took the hood off when I was standing against the wall. There was light in the place but I couldn’t see well, just seemed to be a dim orange light from the roof. I saw two men both stripped to the waist.
    One of them said in an English voice, ‘Do you want to see anybody?’ I answered, ‘No’. Immediately they put the hood on again. I got a few thumpings. They were wearing what seemed to be the bottom of a track suit or a gym suit. Looked to be blue trousers. As the hood was being put on again I could see the white gym shoes. I have the idea that one had tight blondish hair. They were very fit and strong looking. This incident happened after I had come back from getting the Detention Order. The soldiers in Ballykinlar had told us there was civil war and that people and children were being shot. All this was coming back to me.
    After I had fallen asleep in the small room, I was told by a Northern Ireland accent to put the hood on. Then they came in. Taken out this time walking. Taken down what seemed to be a corridor, blankets hanging down, roughish hairy material. You had to move in and out between them. Then brought in for interrogation again.

Smooth Interrogator
    This was the first interrogation with the hood off. Before Detention Order it was just rolled up a bit. Table there. Sat in a chair. Told not to look behind me. Hand was placed on each shoulder. The interrogator had black hair thinning a bit at the front, wearing a blue anorak, thinnish, round about thirty-five years old, spoke in educated type of accent, no Northern Ireland twang about it. He said, ‘You are in the IRA’. I said ‘No’. He talked about Republican parades. He said, ‘Do you deny you are a Republican?’ I said, ‘No’. Then sort of casual questions. This particular interrogator never cut rough in the interrogations. Just straight forward simple questions.

Rough Interrogator
    Taken into another room. There was a mattress in this room. Later a blanket. After the door was closed I knew I was on my own and I could take the hood off. I took it off. I lay down on the mattress and went to sleep. The next thing I heard a banging on the door and a voice shouting, ‘Put on your hood’. I was taken by the arms and into a room. Sat in the chair again. The hood was taken off and the fella immediately grabbed me by the lapels of the boiler suit. He lifted me up roaring and shouting, ‘I don’t want any nonsense out of you. I want the truth. You