Ulster Court Rejects Informer Testimony Again, Acquits 20

BELFAST, Northern Ireland — A judge Friday rejected the testimony of a key informer and acquitted 20 Protestant defendants of terrorism charges.

It was the seventh time that evidence supplied to the police by informers has been thrown out of courts in Northern Ireland.

Justice Ian Higgins said that William Allen, 23, who is serving 14 years for the attempted murder of a Roman Catholic, repeatedly lied during the three-month trial here. He called his testimony “unworthy of belief.”

Allen, a former associate of the defendants, was a self-confessed member of an outlawed Protestant paramilitary group, the Ulster Defense Force. The 20 men acquitted had faced more than 100 charges ranging from membership in the Ulster Defense Force to murder, all based on Allen’s statements.