Serial Killers - THE SHANKILL BUTCHERS - 'Only Cowards Kill the Innocent'

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Video Information:
The Shankill Butchers were an Ulster loyalist gang—many of whom were members of the Ulster Volunteer Force (UVF)—that was active between 1975 and 1982 in Belfast, Northern Ireland. It was based in the Shankill area and was responsible for the deaths of at least 23 people, most of whom were killed in sectarian attacks.
The gang was notorious for kidnapping, torturing and murdering random or suspected Catholic civilians; each was beaten ferociously and had their throat hacked with a butcher's knife. Some were also tortured and attacked with a hatchet. The gang also killed six Ulster Protestants over personal disputes, and two other Protestants mistaken for Catholics.

Most of the gang were eventually caught and, in February 1979, received the longest combined prison sentences in United Kingdom legal history. However, gang leader Lenny Murphy and his two chief "lieutenants" escaped prosecution. Murphy was murdered in November 1982 by the Provisional IRA, likely acting with loyalist paramilitaries who perceived him as a threat. The Butchers brought a new level of paramilitary violence to a country already hardened by death and destruction. The judge who oversaw the 1979 trial described their crimes as "a lasting monument to blind sectarian bigotry".

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[CouncilOfWolves]

I believe I was almost one of their victims as a kid. I was walking along the Antrim Road and just where the police station is now I walked past two men standing at a bus stop and a black taxi was parked on the road. It was dark and as I walked past them I don't know why but something told to me run. I turned around and they were almost on me. I ran as fast as I could and jumped through a hole in the hedge of the old house on the corner of the Cavehill Road and hid. When I finally came out they had vanished. I continued on down to the Quality shop facing the Waterworks and walked back home the same way. I never told anyone, not even my parents. It was years later that it suddenly dawned on me who they could have been. I think I was about thirteen or fourteen at the time.

[DeclanBlack-bn]

They took my granddad who was a loving family man hardworking generous loving and caring it destroyed part of my mother

[paulhealy]

I was picked up, hitchhiking, by a UVF paramilitary. 1981. I had Derry written on a cardboard sign, which marked me out as a Catholic.
Once he had me in the car he started saying that he’d no idea where Derry was, but he knew a man who would and we should go see him. (Protestants call Derry, Londonderry.)
He took me up into the loyalist Rathcoole housing estate, ignoring my pleas to let me out.
We stopped at a house and he told me to sit there and he went inside.
I was frozen and I just sat there. I saw him and whoever owned the house, looking out the living room window.
I think if I’d run they would have chased me.
But for some reason, it was not my turn to die that day. He came back to the car saying he now knew where it was. He drove me back to the motorway, up the on ramp, let me out, did a U turn and drove directly at on coming traffic, hanging out the window and shouting “Up the UVF!”
He had UVF tats on his arms, and on his way to return me back to my life he told me he was just out of prison.
What I believe happened is that he caught a Catholic and brought me to a more senior person in the Rathcoole UVF who told him to wise up and put me back.

[royferguson]

I was walking up the Shankill Road after leaving a club, I was coming up to the Berlin Arms when I noticed a car coming down the road slowly with just side lights on. In those days I was a very fast runner, as I got to near Berlin Street I took off up the street I heard the car speed up, I run up a side street and halfway up there was a Ford transit van, I stopped behind the van, the car turned into the Street and sped up it, I went down the street an ran to my house in Winchester St, and nearly put the front door in.
No idea if it was the Butchers or if it was the ira but I had a lucky escape.

[matthewjones]

I did 6 tours of Northern Ireland and sadly some people back in England thought that everyone over there was like this. Not true. The vast majority of people over there were nice decent people, Protestant and Catholic. There were a minority that were fucking savage, but most not at all.

[johndeehan]

A story that needed telling. I am glad my parents got the hell out of there after listening to that retired policeman.

[RenegadeZoo]

It wasn't and still isn't a normal society, lets pray that history does not repeat itself to this degree again 🙏

[nomdeplume]

One day in about 1965 I was walking to St. Anne's RC primary school in Stretford, Manchester with my friend John Kennedy when two similar aged kids came the other way. One of them shouted "Catlicks!" John shouted "Proddydogs!" back. That was the only time I was directly exposed to sectarianism in my life. I had to ask my Mum what it meant.

In 1989 I was on a course in Glasgow and on the local news Mo Johnston was featured as having signed for Rangers having previously played for Celtic. Rangers fans were shown burning their season tickets and Celtic fans calling him a traitor.

I'm still as baffled by it 35 years later. It's an insanity passed from father to son and I'm just glad that was never passed down to me by my father.

[IanFielding-vhqf]

Peace On The Victims* PLEASE BRING PEACE FOR ALL HUMAN BEINGS IN 🇮🇪 IRELAND*.

[armac]

Pure evil. And shame on that RUC officer, and I’m a Protestant from Glasgow.

[teslagirl]

We are all born wanting and needing the same things...food, warmth, love...a change of clothes when we need it...a place to feel safe. We all come into this world naked, helpless and achingly vulnerable. Yet within each of us are also the same possibilities and our faith, class, race, place of origin or the politics of our families CANNOT limit those possibilities. We can be stubborn and stupid one moment but tenacious and brilliant the next and those of us who have the least are often the most generous. We are at our very best when things are at their worst. We all face the same challenges and are stronger when we stand together. We all know sorrow and we all know joy. Even our differences can be a source of delight if we let them. We have so much, so very much, to love each other for.

I only wish people who get swept up in hatred and violence could realize this before that way of life consumes them.

[lfssasp]

Thanks for the down load, powerful stuff, may all the victims rest in peace

[annmcardle]

Disgusting for that animal to have soldier on his grave rot in hell

[EdinburghMayhem]

I live in Scotland. I'm in my 60's. I remember 'the troubles' so well. It was on the news every night. I'll never forget that time. It must have been terrifying.

[Galwayblazer]

Apparently the Shankill people weren’t too ashamed of the butcher serial killers as recently they had Eddie McIllwaine, who was a member of the group of killers between 1975 and 1977 and was convicted of kidnapping and assault marching down the Shankill road as part of their big 12th parade, openly and brazenly, the Orange Order which purports to be a religious, Protestant organization made a statement which previously defended the Shankill Butcher’s role in the organisation in the past, with a spokesman explaining: “Eddie McIlwaine is a member of a lodge and in good standing. The many Catholic victims of the butchers were very disappointed in the Shankill Orange Order for their lack of Christian understanding.

[michellegouda]

Poor Ireland in those days, never to be repeated.

[shingerz]

Wow what a program to watch how murderers can be classed as soldiers and heroes is beyond me what a shame for the poor victims

[MarkGrijalva]

We live in a depressing, demoralizing, hopeless, cruel world

[scrappydoo]

This is an excellent channel 👍
Thank you for your efforts from a Brit who is only old enough to clearly remember the last couple of years before the official end of the troubles.

[dazuk]

I hadn't heard of this before, what a truly horrific and evil thing to do to so many people. I still find it hard to believe that some people can be so ruthless and evil. Seeing the pain in the eyes of the families is heartbreaking. God bless those victims and their families.