Case against man jailed for prison officer murder ‘was compelling’

Christopher Robinson, 51, is mounting a legal bid to overturn a verdict that he participated in the bomb attack on Adrian Ismay in March 2016.

Defence lawyers claim his non-jury trial was distorted by DNA from a poppy appeal sticker allegedly attached to the car used to plant the device.

But prosecutors argued that the wider circumstances meant a finding of guilt was inescapable.

David McDowell QC submitted: “The evidence of targeting (Mr Ismay), his apparent support for violent republicanism, his antipathy towards the treatment of prisoners, and his internet searches for the magnetic qualities of aluminium, when two magnets were used to secure this device, all combine to provide a compelling case against him.”

Judgment was reserved following a two-day hearing in the appeal against conviction.

Mr Ismay, a 52-year-old father of three, suffered serious leg injuries when a bomb exploded under the van he was driving near his home at Hillsborough Drive, east Belfast.

Despite an apparent initial recovery, he died 11 days later.

Dissident republican grouping the New IRA claimed responsibility for the deadly attack.

Robinson, from Aspen Walk in Dunmurry, denied involvement in the killing of Mr Ismay - who he knew from their time volunteering together for St John Ambulance.

But he received a minimum 22-year sentence after being found guilty of murder and possessing explosives with intent to endanger life.

The trial judge held that he had been “intimately and inextricably involved” in the plot.

A circumstantial case against him involved CCTV footage of a Citroen C3 car - registered in the name of a relative - which transported the bomb.

Robinson’s DNA was found on the edge of a poppy appeal sticker recovered from a rubbish bin at the vehicle owner’s home.

In convicting him of Mr Ismay’s murder, the judge said the Remembrance Day emblem had been put on the windscreen of the C3 in a cynical ploy to ensure the car would not appear out of place in east Belfast.

However, Robinson’s legal team challenged findings that the label was attached to the vehicle.

They argued that inferences were wrongly made, with too much prominence given to a sticker which the defendant may not have had any direct contact with.

Responding for the Crown, Mr McDowell maintained that the DNA evidence linked Robinson to the Citroen on the night the bomb was planted.

Citing Facebook postings in further strands of the prosecution case, the barrister contended: “It’s more than political leanings. It’s violent republicanism which is, in law, terrorism.”

Robinson’s phone had also been switched off in a bid to hinder detection of his movements, the court heard.

Mr McDowell insisted: “The inescapable inference in this case is of the applicant’s involvement in this enterprise.”

But Arthur Harvey QC, for Robinson, told the court it is impermissible to speculate in the absence of evidence.

He claimed that his client’s alleged backing for militant republicanism had been “overhyped”.