Aidan McAnespie: Soldier ‘pale and shocked’ after ‘accidental discharge’ of bullets, court told

David Jonathan Holden, 52, is on trial at Belfast Crown Court accused of the manslaughter of Aidan McAnespie in February 1988.

He denies the offence.

Mr McAnespie, 23, was killed in Aughnacloy, Co Tyrone, moments after walking through a border security checkpoint.

He was on his way to a local Gaelic Athletic Association club when he was shot in the back.

One of Holden’s commanding officers on the day described hearing the crack and then thump of the machine gun fire before running to the sangar and climbing to the first floor where the shots had been fired.

“I found Holden standing to the left of the gun … his back was to the wall and he was looking at me because he could hear me coming up the stairs. I said, ‘what’s happened?’, and he replied ‘I squeezed the trigger’,” he told the court.

“Looking around me I could see three empty cases on the floor … I then unloaded the gun by myself, and I could see he was in shock, and so I sent Holden back down where I could see he probably needed a cup of tea.

“He was of a pale pallor, expressionless, mouth open, you know, somebody who clearly was upset by what had happened.”

The witness said at that point, as far as he understood, there had been a “negligent discharge, nothing more”.

Mr Justice O’Hara queried had he not looked out to see if anyone had been hit by the bullets.

He replied: “No sir, it didn’t occur to me that he had been aiming at somebody”.

The judge continued: “whether he was aiming at somebody or not, that’s another matter, if a gun is negligently discharged and you believed that three bullets had been fired, do you not look out at see if someone has been hit?”

He responded: “It’s something I didn’t do sir”.

The court heard the witness contacted the operations room to inform them of an accidental discharge.

Later reports from the public came in that someone had been shot, at which point he said he updated his report of the incident.

Holden is a former Grenadier guardsman from England, whose address on court documents is given as c/o Chancery House, Victoria Street, Belfast.

The case at Belfast Crown Court is proceeding amid the continuing controversy over Government plans to prohibit future Troubles-related prosecutions.

Despite announcing its intent last summer, the Government is yet to table draft legislation in Parliament that would ban future prosecutions of military veterans and ex-paramilitaries for Troubles incidents predating April 1998.

The Holden case is one of a series of high-profile prosecutions of veterans that have been pursued in Northern Ireland in recent years.