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00:13There was no second in the races he won. No one remembers who was second because there was only
00:19one winner. So it was a huge celebration when it was announced that he would be coming to
00:25Belly Manny's stud at the caravan. A star was coming back home. The star happened to be a horse but
00:32that's what he was. He was a star. There was no security at the star. You and I could have
00:38just
00:38walked in. At the same time there was political instability. The IRA grew out of extinction in
00:46the early 1970s. In order to carry out a conflict against the British state they needed to undertake
00:53fundraising actions. So they start kidnapping. If you kidnap an individual it is essentially a
00:58political act. Nobody had conceived of the idea that a horse could be taken and held ransom.
01:05Shergar, one of the most highly valued horses in the world, was taken by gunmen from Belly Manny's
01:09stud near Newbridge in Caddy Cildare during the night. They reputedly said that they wanted two
01:14million for him so they were very clear about what was going on. The world and its mother in
01:19terms of the press pack descended on the small village in County Cildare in Ireland. Forensic
01:26experts visited the scene this afternoon but so far details of where the ten million pounds
01:32horse was taken remain a mystery. Negotiations that were taking place at a higher level and
01:38ransom calls began to take the story in another direction. There's only one way of describing it,
01:45a shitshow.
02:04The men who stole Shergar came up this driveway in the darkness of last Tuesday night.
02:09Today its brightness belies the fact it leads to the beginning of the Shergar drama.
02:16For the government of the day this was an international story and we would have to say an international
02:22security embarrassment. What were the police doing? What were the An Garda Siakana doing?
02:28And then the question for the guards. How are we going to handle what is going inevitably to become a
02:35big international story?
02:42It is open to anyone who offers a reward. Not to communicate with the guardian. I have said that at
02:52all times. The people who wish to give a reward is open to them not to
02:57communicate with the guard.
03:00Chief Superintendent Jim Murphy known as Spud Murphy led the investigation and truth be told he became something of a
03:09figure of fun.
03:10Chief Superintendent James Murphy is leading Garda Investigations. I asked him if he thought the horse was being held in
03:16the region of the Curragh.
03:17It could be anywhere in the country. It could be anywhere.
03:21He wasn't one of the top hot shots in the police service.
03:26James Murphy was a kind of an enigmatic, philosophical, detached, quizzical man and he liked to indulge the Irish pastime
03:36of answering a question with a question.
03:39Of refusing to come to the point or talking around the subject as we do so well in this country.
03:44We are still continuing our inquiries and our investigations and our searches right through the country.
03:50Have you got any leads at all now? Are you any further ahead than you were yesterday?
03:56I regret to say that I am not.
03:58A journalist once commented that Chief Superintendent James Murphy was the most comical cop since Inspector Clouseau.
04:07Now, that may be very unkind given some of the work that he had done previously.
04:11He was not someone who was completely wet behind the ears when it came to dealing with the crimes of
04:17subversives.
04:17Nonetheless, you have to think of the optics.
04:21He presided over press conferences wearing a three-piece suit and a trilby, which was pushed slightly back on his
04:29head and cocked to one side.
04:31From the point of view of the international press and particularly journalists, reporters and cameramen from the UK, he came
04:38across like a stage Irishman.
04:41Horse Box was taken on Saturday, Sunday morning, Saturday night, Sunday morning. It is still outstanding. Therefore, I am interested.
04:50There wasn't a sophisticated guard communications operation. So, obviously, it was a little bit of making it up on the
04:59hoof, in terms of the PR, and it was catastrophic.
05:04What we haven't got, he told the assembled journalists, is a clue. Now, he was being honest, and they hadn't
05:10got a clue, but that was not necessarily the best way to handle the beginning of the police investigation.
05:16He had no new information at any stage to go on, so he was never going to look like somebody
05:22who was in control of the situation. He was not a loser.
05:27Do you suspect that people officials at the Stats may be prepared to do a deal?
05:33That, I could not say. As I have said from the start, that would be a matter for themselves. I
05:39would be advising against the payment of a ransom.
05:44I got a phone call about 2 o'clock in the morning. I was asleep in my hotel. He was
05:49mumbling away. I just woke up. Hello, is that Derek Thompson? It's Fleet Street.
05:54I thought it was somebody having a go, a silly laugh. So, I put the phone down, rang back straight
06:01away. No, it's the Fleet Street. We've had the kidnappers of Shergar on. They want you to fly over to
06:07Belfast.
06:08And that is how I heard at 2.30 in the morning. And they said, they want you, Lord Oaxie,
06:14a former top jockey, former champion amateur jockey, and Peter Campling, who is the tipping man from the Sun, the
06:20footballer calls me out, to negotiate for the release of Shergar.
06:24So, we said, yes, we've got to go.
06:28Derek, do you really know what you're going into in Belfast today?
06:32No, and I don't think any of us do, actually. But I think our conscience has told us to get
06:36on this plane and come over.
06:38Because I think we all agree that if something did happen to the horse, and we weren't there, then we'd
06:43live with that conscience for the rest of our life.
06:44And that would be very, very unfortunate. So, that's the reason we're here.
06:49We got off the plane in Belfast, and the whole place was surrounded by 100 press people with cameras.
06:55And there was us guys, you know, thinking we hadn't heard anything. It was just incredible.
07:01This was the height of the troubles. It was a frightening experience.
07:07There were soldiers all around with guns, there were tanks, there was armoured cars, there was everything, lots and lots
07:13of police.
07:14And I remember on the way from the airport to the hotel, the driver said, do you want me to
07:20show you a little bit what it's like at the moment?
07:23Um, yes, of course. I said, it'll only take a minute. Yeah, of course.
07:28And so we turned off the main road, we turned left, I'll never forget it. He said, lock your doors.
07:35He just drove round, and after 30 seconds, I said, I think we'd better get out of this area. It
07:42was frightening.
07:46Now there were more interesting things going on behind the scenes in terms of trying to begin a search and
07:51trying to locate where Shergar might be.
07:55A lot of the ODCs, the ordinary decent criminals at the time, as the guards used to refer to them,
08:02they were involved in small gangs, a handful of people.
08:05An operation like this, you would have needed many more, and you would have needed to have been very sure
08:09of your escape route.
08:10The level of sophistication and planning here meant that the only game in town was that it was carried out
08:16by the provisional IRA.
08:19There is a propaganda battle ongoing, constantly, as part of the troubles.
08:25And the IRA was acutely aware of that, the perception of it, and how its activities or its operations, as
08:32I'd like to call them, would be perceived.
08:34There was an awareness, of course, that this was not the kind of attention that they wanted.
08:39But what they were clearly looking at was the value.
08:42Now, Shergar was valued at £10 million, which is an extraordinary sum in the early 1980s.
08:47And if you consider the constant money worries and challenges that the IRA had, perhaps that idea of a ransom
08:55demand maybe of £2 million,
08:57that that could solve a lot of short-term problems for the IRA.
09:03Obviously, the hotel has changed a bit. This is new, the front.
09:06But in the old days, when I arrived, it had great big long windows that were up about three storeys.
09:12And there were cracks in all the windows. And I said, what's this for?
09:15And the guy said, well, it's the most bombed hotel in Europe.
09:20And I remember going inside, walking through the front door.
09:23And the world's press were there as well.
09:2560, 70 people with cameras and microphones were following me in and reporters.
09:30And when I got in through the front door, literally within a few seconds,
09:35the voice on the tannoy said, phone call for Mr. Thompson, please pick up the hotel phone.
09:41So I went just around the side there and picked up the hotel phone.
09:47And that's when it all started.
09:50And this voice, which I'll never, ever forget, said, we're watching you from across the street.
09:56This is what we want you to do with the kidnappers of Shergar.
09:59How far is that from Dublin? Yeah, from Belfast.
10:0530 miles. Right. And who am I talking to, by the way?
10:10A man using the fitting code name of Arkel instructed the journalist to drive to an address in County Down,
10:1730 miles outside the city.
10:19Bye-bye.
10:24Well, that's interesting.
10:33We were checked into a room.
10:35Police came up and we're discussing it.
10:36The police were there all the time.
10:38And he had told us to drive out to this farmhouse outside of Belfast, about 30 miles outside.
10:42They said, right, we'll get you out there.
10:44Your driver will take you.
10:46But tell you what the best thing to do, go through the kitchen of the hotel, because otherwise all the
10:51press will see you.
10:51So we did.
10:52We crept through the kitchen of the hotel, ran outside, jumped in the car and took off.
10:58The word farce is inevitably and justifiably used regarding the public spectacle.
11:05The three journalists, for example, who are becoming players, it seems, in ransom negotiations.
11:11The use of code words.
11:13The Europa Hotel, so often referred to as the most bombed hotel in Europe as a result of the troubles.
11:21Those who were making calls, could they be trusted?
11:24Who were they seeking to deal with?
11:26Why were they picking racing journalists?
11:28Was it because they wanted to get messages to other key individuals who actually had a stake in Shergar?
11:36We had no real idea what was going to happen.
11:40We'd been told by this voice on the phone to come to this place outside of Belfast.
11:47And it was, it was just incredible.
11:49We didn't know what was happening.
11:50You know, we were talking to supposed kidnappers, you know, not very nice people at all.
11:56And we were in a strange land, which we hadn't been to for a long time and didn't know much
12:02about.
12:04So we're now coming to the top of the hill.
12:08Three guys jump out in front of us here.
12:11This is incredible.
12:12This is just the same spot.
12:15Three guys jump out with balaclavas, machine guns, and one comes round to my side.
12:21Just stop the car for a second because this brings it all back.
12:25And he went like this with his gun, which meant wind the window down.
12:30Do you remember the old days when you would wind the window down?
12:34All I could see was two eyes, a mouth, and he had the balaclava, and the machine gun, which is
12:42about a foot away from where I was.
12:44And I was sitting here and he said, are you Derek Thompson?
12:51And I said, yes, and I thought they were just going to spray the car with bullets and killers.
13:03And he said the immortal words, we're the police.
13:07I said, thank God for that.
13:09I might have used another word.
13:11He says, drive over the top of the hill, run into the farmhouse, and you'll be contacted inside.
13:16Okay, let's go.
13:19As night fell, the action moved swiftly to a lonely farmhouse at Ard Glass,
13:24the home of one of Ulster's leading racehorse trainers, Jeremy Maxwell.
13:28The three would-be negotiators arrived to find the same anonymous Irishman who claims to have Shergar
13:33had already called Mrs. Judy Maxwell three times, saying the demand was now £40,000.
13:39He seems to be a very rational, well-spoken man.
13:43There really doesn't seem to be a lot more to gather about it.
13:46We feel we should be negotiating a bit more.
13:48We'd like to go on a bit further with negotiations.
13:51But all they could do was wait anxiously for further instructions,
13:55still not knowing if the whole thing was a hoax.
14:01It was such a profoundly stupid thing to undertake that you have to wonder if this was something that was
14:09sanctioned at the senior levels of the IRA.
14:12Surely they would have been aware, A, that this could go very badly wrong, very easily.
14:17B, that the public would obviously turn against anyone who was seen to be putting Shergar, this celebrity horse, this
14:25wonder horse in harm's way.
14:28And see what kind of a national and international focus would it bring on the IRA, a very negative focus
14:35on the IRA.
14:36When you begin to add up those different things, you have to question whether those who were running the IRA
14:42really thought this was a good idea,
14:44or whether they were actually made aware of this plan.
14:48One of the extraordinary things about this also involves a horse's head.
14:52I mean, it's almost like a motif from The Godfather, but it happened.
14:55A photograph arrives of the famous blaze down the nose of the wonder horse,
15:00and somebody is holding up a banner of the Irish news to show the date and that the horse is
15:05alive on this date.
15:06That was a Polaroid. In fact, a couple of Polaroids taken off the horse.
15:10From the syndicate's point of view, that was no guarantee that the horse was alive subsequent to that date.
15:17As this became an international story, the craziest, most lurid allegations were coming forward that the horse had been seen
15:25in Switzerland,
15:26that Lord Lucan was on its back on the veld of South Africa,
15:30and that the horse was already rendered and turning up as cat food in parts of Scotland.
15:34The longer he was kept, the more hopeless it seemed for him.
15:38We really didn't think that they'd pay up. Sad though it is, he was, he's a business asset.
15:45He's no longer a person, he's no longer Al Shergar.
15:51The unanimous view in government was that we couldn't countenance the payment of ransom for a number of reasons.
15:58Not the least of which is the fact that once you pay a ransom in one case, it kind of,
16:04it opens the door for further cases.
16:08And I mean, the bank robberies and robberies of various kinds were the way they were going about getting funding,
16:13apart from the kind of fundraising they always did among sympathizers.
16:17But the main concern was to make sure that the supply of money for the purchase of arms, as far
16:22as possible, should be dried up.
16:24And that was the reason why in the particular case of Shergar, since there might have been a link,
16:29that we were concerned to make sure that no ransom was paid.
16:33At the end of the day, there's a limited amount you can do to make sure that things turn out
16:39that way.
16:40As it happened, some attempts were made unsuccessfully to pay a ransom.
16:49In County Clare, a man had come forward who was a local detective who had been cultivating an IRA informant.
16:57And this man had told him before any horse was kidnapped, he had heard about an IRA dry run involving
17:04a horse box.
17:05And they had simulated the taking of a horse.
17:09He had passed it on to his superiors, but it had been just been shrugged out because it didn't seem
17:15to mean anything.
17:16And then as soon as the horse was taken, this gentleman became very important to the investigation.
17:22He was asked, could he get in contact via his source with the kidnappers?
17:27So there was a back channel going on there.
17:31Well, word then came back from the kidnappers.
17:34They revealed that the horse had actually been suffering from thrush.
17:39And when this was fed back to headquarters and the vet, Stan Cosgrove, was consulted,
17:44he immediately realized this was the truth.
17:47To him, this meant that this back channel was true.
17:51They were absolutely in contact with the real kidnappers.
17:56That then led to a very interesting situation whereby there was a proposal to produce hello money to the kidnappers.
18:04A bank in central Dublin was opened on a Sunday, most unusually, and cash was taken out.
18:09And this sum, £80,000, it would have been a down payment, but it was a serious amount of money.
18:14And that was channeled down to the contact guard, Martin Ken Irons, in South West Ireland.
18:21And he was empowered to meet with the representative group from the IRA and begin negotiations through his contact.
18:30But unfortunately, the money disappeared from the boot of his car outside his house.
18:34And Mr Ken Irons would say that he then became the second victim of the Shergar kidnapped,
18:40because ultimately, Garda headquarters suspected that he must have been in cahoots with his contacts,
18:46and he was dismissed from the force.
18:51The international, you know, image of Ireland, of Keystone's cops in rural Ireland, in an unsophisticated way,
19:00did not reassure people that Shergar was going to be found.
19:05You had, via superintendent Spud Murphy, all of the stuff about clairvoyance.
19:12Between diviners, clairvoyance, and psychic persons, in three different categories,
19:18they must be running into the 50 now.
19:22To have an individual like Murphy, using the kind of language that Murphy used,
19:28and creating the impression that Murphy created, that was not a good look for Ireland.
19:32And it lent itself to satire and the stereotype of the bungling Irish,
19:39of the innocent, guileless Irish.
19:43Complete ineptitude was the image that was being portrayed.
19:47But it really reached the point of ludicrousness when a bunch of photographers
19:52turned up for one of his press conferences, all wearing trilby hats like his.
19:58If you were a journalist filing copy about this sensational development in Ireland,
20:03and you had that raw material to deal with, you were going to make a meal out of it.
20:10There was some irreverent comment around the idea that the Gardaà were stopping cars and checking the boots of cars,
20:17as if Shergar would be in the boot of a car.
20:21But it does raise that question, of course, as to where you could put Shergar during this period.
20:30One of the problems on the day of the kidnapping, that February day, was also a day when there had
20:35been a big sale at Goths,
20:37the blood stock trading business ring, which was only down the road from where the kidnapping happened.
20:43So the roads were filled with horse boxes and people moving horses around.
20:49So it wasn't as though the horse box carrying Shergar would have seemed out of place
20:56or been odd on the roads at that time.
20:58The whole horse industry was out there buying and selling and moving animals around.
21:03So that was the first problem for the guards.
21:06But they did set up roadblocks and they asked the usual questions of motorists
21:09and did anybody see anything unusual.
21:12But literally the horse had bolted, if you can put it that way.
21:18Quite separate to all of that, you have Ballymany Stud being telephoned.
21:24It's Gerald, Jim Fitzgerald being telephoned.
21:26And when the kidnapping happened, he was told there's a code word you will hear from us.
21:32The code word is King Neptune.
21:34So somebody rang him, used the code word King Neptune.
21:37And again, there was a demand for two million ransom.
21:41And they wanted a deal via the Aga Khan's office in Paris.
21:46And the entire circus transfers to Paris.
21:58Hello.
21:59Hello.
22:00This is King Neptune.
22:01Yes, hello.
22:02Just listen.
22:03I want you to answer some questions.
22:05Yes.
22:05Are you the man with the sole power to hand over the money?
22:09No, the shareholders have to decide.
22:11I have to refer to the shareholders.
22:12You get the person who is the sole power to negotiate and hand over the money?
22:17Yes.
22:18In five minutes time.
22:21I am the only one capable of being on that phone.
22:24Right.
22:24Will you get the full power to negotiate?
22:26Yes.
22:27You get it.
22:28Will you have it in five minutes?
22:30The money?
22:31The sole power to negotiate.
22:33I can try to get it.
22:34You'd better get it.
22:36Unless the person with the sole power to negotiate hands over the money is on the phone in five minutes.
22:41The whole deal is off.
22:43Do you understand that?
22:44Well, I understand that, but I have to...
22:46I have to contact the shareholders.
22:48I can't.
22:49They have the sole authority because...
22:51How long will it take you to contact the shareholders?
22:54Sorry?
22:54How long will it take you to contact the shareholders?
22:5935 people and they are all in Ireland.
23:01Most of them.
23:02Well, listen.
23:03You have exactly 60 minutes.
23:05Yes.
23:0660 minutes.
23:0860 minutes.
23:10And that question again of who are we dealing with here?
23:13Is this really somebody who has Shergar?
23:16Is Shergar not dead at this stage?
23:19Who can prove that Shergar is alive?
23:21Can we trust these people who are communicating these messages?
23:24And who are they actually ultimately trying to get to?
23:27I'm fed up being messed around.
23:29Hmm.
23:31We're fed up being messed around.
23:33Your feet up?
23:35Listen.
23:35Don't get fucking smart.
23:37Just listen.
23:38Yes.
23:39We're fed up being messed around.
23:41Okay?
23:42Okay.
23:43We know that all you're doing is delaying us.
23:46No.
23:47You may have some idea that the police will get your horse back.
23:50That's not the case.
23:51No.
23:52No.
23:52The police will never get your horse back.
23:55We believe that the horse is dead.
23:57I'll ring in an hour.
23:58Yes.
23:59You...
24:00You should have the...
24:01The person there with the sole power to negotiate and hand over the money.
24:05I will try to get this power myself.
24:08Yeah, and you got one hour.
24:10That's the limit.
24:11Yes.
24:11No more discussion.
24:14No more deals after one hour.
24:16Unless you've that power, there's no more deals.
24:18You'll never see the fucking horse again.
24:21You don't want to deal in Ireland?
24:23No.
24:24If this person is empowered in Ireland, what happens?
24:28If he is in Ireland, you have his name and address and phone number.
24:31Yes.
24:32You ring and get him to Paris.
24:34Okay.
24:35By the next time I ring, you'll have him there.
24:38Okay.
24:39You have one hour to have that person there at that phone.
24:42And we don't care how you do it.
24:44Yes.
24:44You have a person there at that phone in one hour with total negotiating power.
24:49Okay.
24:50I'm fed up.
24:50Okay.
24:51Okay?
24:52Okay, understood.
24:53It makes you wonder, was there an assumption before this kidnapping that the Aga Khan was
24:59really the only person that they would be dealing with?
25:02The Aga Khan, of course, so spectacularly wealthy and so well known.
25:07Did they think of Shargar's ownership in terms of that figurehead, that one individual,
25:12that they would ultimately have to find a channel of communication directly with the Aga Khan.
25:19But then they discovered that that, of course, is not going to be remotely straightforward.
25:24Hello.
25:25Hello.
25:25This is King Neptune.
25:27Have you got the money ready?
25:28No, the money is not ready.
25:29I always told you.
25:30Listen.
25:31Yes.
25:32If you don't have the money ready by tonight.
25:34Sorry, I can't hear you.
25:36Why have you not got the money ready?
25:38I told you I have to have the agreement of the shareholders.
25:42That's bullshit.
25:43Okay.
25:44What I want to know, are you going to pay money for the horse?
25:47Yes or no?
25:49We have to have the proof the horse is alive.
25:51And has not been harmed.
25:53Because we are not going to pay, and the shareholders are not going to pay.
25:57Are they not going to pay up the money?
25:59If the horse has been harmed, and they are not going to pay for the huntsless horse.
26:04Listen.
26:05They are certainly not going to pay for the huntsless horse.
26:08You can be sure of that.
26:10If we have to kill this horse, it'll be you that killed him.
26:13Yes.
26:13But you will be responsible to your country for that.
26:17What?
26:18You are going to damage the reputation of your country and the economy.
26:23Do you think I give a shite about it?
26:25Oh, in that case, that owns our matter.
26:28That's another matter, right?
26:29Right.
26:30All I'm interested in is getting that money.
26:33You're either willing to pay the money, or you're not willing to pay the money.
26:36Okay, I will convey this message immediately, but it takes me some time to get it all of these people.
26:43Listen.
26:44Just let me make one more point to you.
26:47Yes.
26:47You may not pay for this horse, but you definitely will pay for the next one when you see what
26:52we do to this one.
26:53Do you understand that?
26:55For the Aga Khan and the shareholders to pay a ransom would have set a very, very dangerous precedent.
27:01Like, if that happened, then that probably would have put all valuable stallions all over the world in jeopardy from
27:09then on.
27:10The space becomes so crowded in relation to calls and messages and demands, of course, for proof that Shergar is
27:18alive.
27:19The longer this drags on, the less likely Shergar is alive or is going to be found alive.
27:25And there would have been a growing skepticism on the part of those who had an interest in Shergar,
27:29that there was actually any point in dealing with multiple supposed kidnappers or those speaking on behalf of the kidnappers.
27:37Mr. Dryon is not satisfied with the proof, and I am sure the shareholders will not be satisfied with it.
27:45If you're not satisfied, well, that's it.
27:55I'd taken a number of phone calls throughout the afternoon and evening from the supposed kidnapper of Shergar.
28:03It was very difficult.
28:06What we were trying to do was save the world's best racehorse from possible deaths to try and get him
28:11back.
28:12And we don't know to this day whether we were talking to the real kidnappers or whether it was somebody
28:18else to try and divert the world's press from what was happening elsewhere.
28:26There was a phone call at 7 o'clock. I didn't take it because I was asleep.
28:31And apparently the voice said, it was a simple phone call,
28:36the horse has had an accident. He's dead. And the phone went dead.
28:44And that's the last we heard from the supposed kidnappers.
28:50This is a town of horses, of horse lovers, indeed almost of horse worshippers.
28:56And today everyone here is desperately trying to convince themselves that the appalling phone calls in Belfast this morning will
29:03turn out to be nothing more than an obscene hopes.
29:06The man in charge of the investigation here in Newbridge, Chief Superintendent James Murphy, was noncommittal when asked about the
29:14calls today.
29:15It is very difficult to say at this stage. It would appear from the reports on last night's news bulletin
29:22during the interview with Mr. Maxwell that the people were the people concerned.
29:29And this morning, I am beginning to doubt that. And to be honest, I do not know.
29:37It was a big story in the one, two, three, four days afterwards. The problem is that after that, there's
29:43very little facts to be reported.
29:46And for a journalist like myself in the Irish Times, the story kind of lost legs after a few days.
29:54In truth, what happened probably happened within a couple of hours of the horse being taken.
30:01He's been shot. He's dead. That wasn't a surprise. You know, that was going to happen.
30:06Without somebody who understood stallions, not just horses, but a thoroughbred stallion, it was inevitable that at some point, the
30:15longer he was kept, the more hopeless it seemed for him.
30:21You couldn't make it up in some senses. It was daring to do it. Had it worked, it would have
30:26been brilliant.
30:27It was also incredibly stupid. I mean, these were characters who kidnapped this horse who clearly hadn't a clue how
30:33to handle a really seasoned stallion that needed very careful management and careful looking after.
30:40All the stuff about code names, you know, King Neptune, there were all sorts of bizarre things about it from
30:46the IRA side.
30:47The double attempt to get a ransom negotiation going, one in Belfast and the other in Dublin via Paris, etc,
30:55etc.
30:55The fact that Shergar was such a winner. I mean, he won the Epson Derby by 10 lengths, never equaled
31:02before or since.
31:03He was a magnificent animal. He was part of a world that was filled with aristocracy, with glamour. It had
31:10so much going for it as a story.
31:12As was famously said, the guards didn't have a clue. In the absence of a clue, there's a blank canvas
31:20there and onto that blank canvas can be painted all sorts of different theories and ideas and an awful lot
31:27of speculation as to who planned this, what they had in mind, how they carried it out and what the
31:34fallout was.
31:35You cannot prove definitively any of those things, but you can speculate and sometimes you can speculate widely.
31:51I've heard many theories. The one that I think is the most plausible, the horse wasn't simple to manage. I
32:00wouldn't be surprised if they underestimated what they took on.
32:04You absolutely need somebody who's skilled and experienced in the management of stallions. And if you don't have somebody like
32:11that to look after a horse like Shergar at the time, then you're possibly going to end up in trouble.
32:20You can have a very sophisticated plan on paper in relation to a heist or a kidnapping. When you put
32:27it into practice, human frailty, human mistakes, emotion, a small twist or turn can throw the entire plan into disarray.
32:36And then you have the question of personality and the temperament, both of the kidnappers and those they are kidnapping
32:43and how that might affect the plan they have. So it can very easily go wrong. Imagine trying to do
32:50that with a horse.
32:54One day, I talked to the owner of a golf club who was a racing man and he ran me.
33:02He said, Tommy, you'll never believe what I've just heard. I said, what if you just did?
33:07Because the horse had a white blaze down the front of his face. They had to put something over it
33:14to get rid of the white blaze. So apparently they put boot polish over the white blaze.
33:23And apparently that burnt the horse's head. And not surprisingly, the horse went crazy if he felt his face was
33:34burning like we would. And that's why then they shot him.
33:42An IRA source interviewed by the Daily Telegraph, not terribly long after all this as well, said yes, that the
33:49horse injured himself. We, the IRA, machine gunned it to death. And he describes an awful scene of blood and
33:59mayhem as they tried to kill the horse. The horse wouldn't die, but eventually they did kill the horse.
34:06And this. And this source believed that the body was probably buried in Ballinamore in County Leecham.
34:14You know, when I look around here and I wonder, did they bury the horse in a place like this?
34:23Rumour has it that lots of things are buried around here, but they're just rumours.
34:33I tried to think what happened to the horse, but I tell you something, this is the bleakest of bleak
34:39places. It really is.
34:40I know the IRA used to dump arms and hide bodies and things like that in here, but it's absolutely
34:48unbelievable.
34:49Look, I mean, you could just go five yards. You wouldn't even find it. It's as simple as that. If
34:55you don't stay on the track, if you walk in the trees, nobody would find it for a hundred years.
35:01It took on a sinister meaning when this guy who said he was from the IRA and they're the ones
35:06who stole used the code word and immediately that was the code word and I'd never told anybody about it.
35:14And he used King Neptune. And I realised then that that was the guy who I'd been talking to. So
35:22I had been talking to the kidnappers of Suga and all these years later, I realised they were part of
35:31it.
35:33It's actually really quite distressing, the idea of this beautiful animal, this aristocratic animal being terrified as he must have
35:44been and being riddled with bullets and probably not dying in the first wave of bullets that were fired into
35:50him, falling on the floor, blood everywhere, writhing in agony and then being finished off with more machine gun fire.
35:58It's horrible.
36:02What happens over the course of decades is that certain theories grow wings, certain stories are embellished. One question we
36:09do need to consider, who authorised this? If you are undertaking something on this scale, has it been authorised at
36:16the very top?
36:16We have conflicting accounts as to whether it was or not. Was this somebody within the lower ranks of the
36:23IRA trying to make an impact, trying to prove their worth, trying to impress the hierarchy of the IRA?
36:30You cannot discount the fact that there are very strong minded individuals within the Republican organisation who may be nurturing
36:36their own ideas as a result, perhaps even of their own interests, or may be hugely influenced by the scale
36:43of media coverage around, in this case, sugar or a horse or what the potential might be there to create
36:50an impact.
36:51The IRA terrified because they were in the business of terror. And they were in the business of inflicting terror.
37:00And, you know, these were people who they would kidnap people, put plastic bags over their heads, blow their brains
37:08out, dump their bodies on a border, or dig a hole in a bog and dump them.
37:12And even to this day, there are efforts to try and find the bodies that the IRA disappeared. You know,
37:18you talk about death squads in Latin America. We had death squads here on both sides.
37:23The IRA put no warning bombs in public houses, hotels, shopping centres, murdered children, murdered women, civilians all over the
37:32place. They killed more people in Northern Ireland than the British Army.
37:35So, you know, when I was thinking back about the Shergar thing and thinking to myself, how could you do
37:41that to an animal, they wouldn't have thought twice about that.
37:45These are people who murdered civilians, women and children. They wouldn't have cared one shit about a horse.
37:54I tried to write a book to mark the 30th anniversary of the taking of Shergar. And I wanted to
38:00call it Taking Shergar.
38:03My idea was to tell the story from the inside out. By this stage, peace had descended. We were all
38:09getting on with our lives.
38:10There were old men that knew what happened to the horse. And I let out word because I wanted to
38:16write the story from their point of view so that they could tell it.
38:21And of course, we'd give different names to the individuals in the active service unit who were involved.
38:26And this would write a wrong. It would write a wrong because so many people were wronged by the taking
38:31of Shergar.
38:31Innocent shareholders, a poor vet, the Irish racing public, the British racing public.
38:38At the end of it, I would be able to give a location for the remains, the skeleton to be
38:44dug up wherever it was.
38:48So I let out word. And on a particular Saturday, two members of the Republican movement turned up and sat
38:56around my kitchen table.
38:57And one of them was young. And so I immediately knew that he had very little to do with the
39:03case, could only have been a schoolboy at the time.
39:05And the other was an old, gnarled, hard man with a mask of a visage on him, who was impassive
39:14to say the least.
39:15And the young man was asking all the questions. Why do you want to write this book? How are you
39:21going to do it? What's your proposal?
39:23And the other chap was just sitting back and regarding me coldly.
39:27But it gradually dawned on me that the bones could not be produced. They were beyond use, as the decommissioning
39:36phrase has it.
39:37And as I gently probed further, it wasn't a matter of digging anything up.
39:42I was given to understand that, in fact, the horse could have been buried at sea.
39:49At one level, it's a surprise and it's another crazy theory. But if you dwell on it, you realise that
39:56makes a hell of a lot of sense.
39:57The IRA already were master gunrunners. They'd had lots of shipments of arms into Ireland, large trawlers sailing from Gaddafi's
40:06Libya.
40:06So ships were no problem to them, little trawlers, with derricks.
40:12I mean, it would have been a very easy thing to crane a weighty carcass onto the deck of a
40:18trawler
40:18and to put out from some fishing port north of the border that's solidly Republican,
40:25and then a big splash to take place a couple of miles off the coast.
40:29How could you possibly return any bones in that circumstance?
40:35It's something I'll never, ever forget. I can remember it as if it was yesterday.
40:42It is that clear in my mind over 40 years on. I would love it to be a happy ending.
40:49You know, we watch a film or we read a book. There's nothing like a happy ending.
40:53Ah, that was lovely. You close the book and you put it down. You've enjoyed it.
40:57But here, I'd love to have known basically what had happened to the horse.
41:03I hope it was instant. I hope it was all right.
41:08I know it's over 40 years since we saw him, but I'll never, ever forget him.
41:15There was a time when people used to watch out for possible Shergar codes or fillings.
41:21If a new entrant on the scene was doing well, somebody would always see,
41:25is there possibly a link back there to Shergar? But it was never found.
41:30Eventually, the Shergar story just became a regrettable part of history.
41:38Shergar was a hero to the public. He crossed over that horse racing threshold.
41:45So he became a news feature even before he was kidnapped.
41:49He was a beautiful horse. No horse has won the derby by 10 lengths before or since.
41:55He was just a very special race horse.
42:00There have been many great race horses, and there's no doubt that Shergar was one of them.
42:05But his story, his disappearance, have ensured that his name is going to be forever remembered,
42:15not only as a race horse, but as folklore within the country.
42:20He was such a superstar himself. The race horse Shergar, the athlete Shergar.
42:25To win a classic trial, to win the Chester Vals, to win the derby by 10 lengths,
42:30a distance that hasn't been bettered since and hadn't been bettered before,
42:33than to go on and win the Irish Derby and the King George as well.
42:35To achieve all that, that's very, very unusual.
42:39A horse who had so much more to give as a stallion,
42:43whose impact on the blood stock industry could have been so much bigger and better
42:49and more significant than it was.
42:52It's very, very sad for all the reasons.
42:55A beautiful animal like that should meet his end in that manner.
42:59I've been a farmer myself, and you have livestock losses.
43:02It's the loss of, you know, generations,
43:06future derby winners, classic winners and so on, being deprived of that.
43:10Those are the first seven as they come down.
43:14Because Shergar's don't come along every day.
43:19It will continue to leak into the news and current affairs in different ways.
43:25Because somebody will turn up with a skull.
43:29Or somebody will say, I have a suspicion that Shergar is buried there.
43:34Or I heard it from X, who heard it from Y, that this is definitely where it happened.
43:40And it does, it prolongs a story, it prolongs a legacy.
43:45Again, in the absence of concrete proof, you can't push Shergar to bed as a story and as a drama.
44:00The
44:01Politics, policy and the issues making headlines.
44:04Take a closer look at the stories driving the national conversation.
44:07Monday with Gavin Riley, Monday night at 10 on Virgin Media Play and Virgin Media One.
44:12o
44:31town
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