Adrian Ismay murder: Ex-St John Ambulance volunteer goes on trial

Christopher Alphonson Robinson, of Aspen Park in the Poleglass area of west Belfast, denies the murder of the 45-year-old father of three who initially survived the blast from the under-car improvised explosive device detonated under his VW transporter.

However, Belfast Crown Court heard that on March 15, 2016, 11 days after the explosion detonated as he drove from his Hillsborough Drive home in east Belfast, Mr Ismay died from a pulmonary embolism as a result of clotting caused by shrapnel from the blast.

The prosecution in the non-jury Diplock-style trial claimed that 48-year-old Robinson was “part of a joint enterprise” to plant the under-car device, allegedly transported to the area in Robinson’s sister-in-law’s Citroen C3 car.

Robinson allegedly picked up the car keys from the hostel where his brother worked, and the Citroen was captured on CCTV travelling through Belfast to the street of Mr Ismay’s home.

Footage taken from an undertaker’s in Hillsborough Drive shows a Citroen car driving along the street, and then parked up, its headlights off. A man is also seen running and getting “oddly” as the prosecution claim, into the back of the car, behind the driver.

When the car was seized two days after the blast, two child seats were found strapped in the car, in the front passenger seat, and on the rear seat immediately behind it.

Trial judge Mr Justice McAlinden was told it was the prosecution contention that when all of the “evidence is viewed in the round there is an inescapable inference that Christopher Robinson was involved in the joint enterprise to plant the device under Mr Ismay’s car with the intention of killing or seriously injuring him”.

Opening the prosecution case, the senior Crown lawyer said while he “did not seek to ascribe a precise role to him ... we do not have to ... the court may, in due course, be satisfied as to that role .... in that he provided, at the very least, intentional assistance or encouragement to the joint enterprise, to plant the device, cause the explosion and murder Mr Ismay”.

In addition to the murder charge, Robinson also denies causing the explosion which initially injured Mr Ismay, who, the court heard, had confirmed in a statement prior to his death that the two men had been in the St John Ambulance together, and that Robinson would have known he was a prison officer.

Robinson also denies a third, alternative count, of providing his sister-in-law’s Citroen C3 car, knowing or suspecting it would be used for the purposes of terrorism.