Thatcher's Spy: My Life as an MI5 Agent Inside Sinn Féin

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WILLIE CARLIN: You know, soldiers rights and writing a magazine and stuff. So I think maybe they seen that in me. NARRATOR: As MI5 had predicted, he’d naturally become something of a community organizer, stepping in to advocate for his neighbors when they had issues with the local authorities. One night in 1977 his role suddenly became rather more involved.

Horrified by the IRA’s shooting of census worker Joanna Mather in 1981, Carlin was determined to return to undercover work. Willie spent three seasons at Carlisle. The Blues were promoted as Third Division champions at the end of Willie’s first season, more than held their own in the second tier the following season and then missed promotion to the top flight by one place in the season after that. One of Willie’s team-mates at Carlisle was the future Leicester City cult hero, the centre-forward, Frank Large. NARRATOR: Willie returned to his home city, and moved into a house on the Gobnascale estate in the Waterside. A small Catholic enclave in an overwhelmingly Protestant area. As you can probably imagine, that fact alone meant trouble. NARRATOR: And there’s one more thing you need to know. The British Army was supported by paramilitary groups like the Ulster Volunteer Force, the UVF for short. We’ll meet them a little later on. Willie’s story begins a decade before The Troubles began.

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At the end of January, counsel for Jon Boutcher announced to a Belfast courtroom that his team had passed 12 files to public prosecutors, involving as many as 30 people and including nine murders. In the frame, in addition to Scappaticci, are thought to be Crown lawyers who participated in the cover-up about Stakeknife. Then there are the agent-runners and senior officers of the FRU, some of whom may have been interviewed under caution. One of Scappaticci’s former handlers agreed to meet me for this story, but then abruptly cancelled. Another declined to be interviewed on the basis of the ongoing criminal investigation, but told me, “We veterans also hope the truth may be known some day.” Now Mr Carlin has claimed that he saw the future deputy first minister leaving a house used by British intelligence in 1980. Mr Carlin, who had left Londonderry in 1965 to join the Royal Irish Hussars, said that in 1974 he was recruited by MI5 at the former cottage of the legendary TE Lawrence – Lawrence of Arabia – and asked to return to his home city. READ MORE: Sectarian problem that is afflicting Glasgow is still a major blight in Northern Ireland Carlin, aged in his 70s at the time of his passing, is reported to have passed away at the beginning of February.

It was awful,” Willie continued. “The bad weather meant that there were no games played. I was top scorer in my second season there but that was because no one else could play, apart from me and Don McEvoy, the manager. We were relegated from the Third Division. Carlin worked for MI5 but later moved to work for the British army’s undercover Force Research Unit (FRU) which was responsible for handling former UDA intelligence officer Brian Nelson, who provided information which was later used to target Catholics. a b c d e f g h i "Willie Carlin newspaper interview". LFCHistory (source) . Retrieved 2 August 2016.Republicans had urged a boycott of the census during the 1981 Hunger Strike, which resulted in the deaths of 10 members of the IRA and INLA.

Capped by England at schoolboy and youth level, Willie started his career at Liverpool as a 16-year-old. He signed professional forms at Anfield in May 1958 and made his debut five months later. After leaving Anfield in 1962, he went on to make 445 appearances in all four divisions of the Football League, playing for Halifax Town, Carlisle United, Sheffield United, Derby County, Leicester City, Notts County and Cardiff City. While he was working for British intelligence his sister Doreen, who died recently, was active with Cumann na mBan, the women’s wing of the IRA, joining the same year he began with MI5. While still a serving soldier he got married and returned home to Derry in 1974 after agreeing to gather political intelligence for MI5. It was a real surprise, genuinely so, for me to come across this book. I knew Willie Carlin really well. I didn’t know he had written a book about his life.Despite the principle of non-aggression here, Scotland remained a key front for the IRA during the Troubles, he explained. The country was a base for fundraising, safe houses, and gun-running. The IRA’s governing Army Council did not want to risk violence in Scotland hampering such operations, or hindering support from Scots sympathetic to the republican cause. And you can't claim benefits - apart from child benefit - because the rest of them are all run from Belfast."

A self-confessed former MI5 agent has broken his silence for the first time about spying on republicans.

Inside story: Why the IRA never attacked Scotland

Through his long-term deception, Willie Carlin was partly responsible for setting the Provos on the path to political engagement that ultimately undermined their armed struggle and saw them embrace the ballot box," he said. Speaking to the Irish News, Mr Carlin, who revealed he has spoken to the Kenova team, questioned the death of Brian Nelson. What had happened was that Arthur, who had just been appointed as team manager, had told Cloughy that he was getting rid of me. I realised I had to go, so I went to Derby.” In the early months of living in England, he found himself battling the withdrawals of such a high. In a wide-ranging interview with the Belfast Telegraph, Carlin insists that he made "a valuable contribution to people's lives" and helped to persuade Sinn Fein to follow the political path, along with McGuinness and Mitchel McLaughlin, whom he calls the "Ant and Dec" of the republican movement.