Martin Ingram is thepseudonym of ex-British Army soldier Ian Hurst, who served in theIntelligence Corps andForce Research Unit (FRU). He has made a number of allegations about the FRU and its conduct of theBritish Army, its operations inNorthern Ireland via the FRU, and against figures in theProvisional Irish Republican Army (IRA) andSinn Féin.[1][2]
Born inGreater Manchester in October 1960, Ingram joined theParachute Regiment in 1980, and was thereafter recruited by the Intelligence Corps. At the completion of his training Ingram was promoted tolance corporal. Ingram was posted to 121 Intelligence unit in Northern Ireland in late 1981, where his main job was to inputRoyal Ulster Constabulary intelligence documents into a British military intelligence database atThiepval Barracks. A few months later, he was moved to another department that focused on gathering intelligence onLoyalist paramilitaries in northBelfast. In 1982, Ingram was posted toEbrington Barracks inDerry to work as an intelligence analyst for the Force Research Unit and was promoted tocorporal. Ingram moved to England in the summer of 1984 for personal reasons and continued to work in the fieldcounter terrorism, which included a 6 month tour of duty inBelize to monitor developments inSandinista Nicaragua. Ingram was promoted tosergeant in 1986 and returned to Northern Ireland in 1987 to work as a covert agent handler for the Force Research Unit while being based out ofRAF St Angelo.[3]
Ingram left Northern Ireland for the final time in late September 1990 and applied for Premature Voluntary Retirement from the British military the following year. Regarding his motive for leaving the British Army, Ingram would later claim that he became romantically involved with his future wife in the late 1980's while posted in Northern Ireland, and the fact her family inCounty Donegal had Irish Republican sympathies would have had a negative effect on his career prospects if he had continued working forBritish military intelligence. By the early 2000's, Ingram was living inCounty Tipperary.[3]
In 1999, Ingram gave a series of interviews toThe Sunday Times describing his time as a British covert military intelligence agent, such as howForce Research Unit operators worked closely on missions with elite units such as theSpecial Air Service and the14th Intelligence Company and the methods FRU members used to entice potential agents to work for them. Ingram also described how FRU operators were granted special privileges in the course of their work, such as the power to overrule senior officers in ordering an area to be cleared of regular security force patrols or by requesting immediate helicopter cover. Ingram additionally revealed that the top undercover agent inside the IRA was a man with the codename "Stakeknife", who had been working for the FRU since the late 1970's on an annual salary of £60,000 per year.[4]
In late November 1999, The Sunday Times published an article where Ingram accused FRU operators of being responsible for anarson attack on offices occupied bythe Stevens Inquiry team at RUC Headquarters inCarrickfergus in 1990, which was an apparent effort to destroy evidence of crimescommitted by one of its double agents (allegedlyBrian Nelson).[5][6] Ingram also claimed that an FRU agent within the IRA, who was in charge of an arms dump, had informed his handler that in mid-April 1984 he was ordered to retrieve asniper rifle for use in an upcoming attack. However, to protect the agents cover, the FRU decided to allow the attack to proceed without attempting to thwart it, which resulted in the death ofQueen's Regiment Private Neil Clarke after being shot in the head inDerry on Easter Monday 1984.[7] A few days after the article was published,Defence SecretaryGeoff Hoon obtained aninjunction against The Sunday Times that banned publication of any further information from Ingram.[8][9] In December 1999, Ingram was arrested and questioned under suspicion of breaching theOfficial Secrets Act, however no charges were brought due to lack of evidence.[10]
In the March 2001, Ingram wrote an article for theAndersonstown News to defend his role as awhistleblower, and asserted his motivation for going public was to expose the British government's role in covering up its own security force agents involvement in the murder of innocent people duringThe Troubles. Ingram also claimed that when Brian Nelson was appointed the UDA's intelligence chief in 1987, he handed over their entire cache of targeting files to the FRU, who then updated them with information taken fromRUC Special Branch and Military Intelligence files before handing them back to Nelson for use in the planning of assassinations.[11]
In the summer of 2001, Ingram was interviewed by theLawyers Committee for International Human Rights regarding the murder ofPat Finucane by Loyalist paramilitaries in 1989. Ingram alleged that there were infact three separate attempts to assassinate Finucane, and the first two were thwarted after advance warning by Force Research Unit agentBrian Nelson allowed security forces to temporarily increase troop numbers near his home in northBelfast. Ingram further alleged that the FRU alertedRUC Special Branch to the failed attempts on Finucane's life, and thatWilliam Stobie andTommy Lyttle, who were later involved in the successful assassination of Finucane, were both Special Branch informers at the time.[12]
In 2004, Ingram co-authored a book[13] detailing Force Research Unit activates during the 1980's regarding covert agent handling within illegal Irish paramilitary groups. In the book, Ingram reasserted his claim that a senior IRA member namedFreddie Scappaticci, who once headed itsInternal Security Unit, was the British government's highest-ranking agent, known by the codename "Stakeknife".[14] Ingram also alleges that when information came to light in 1987 that Scappaticci was to be assassinated by theUlster Defence Association, the FRU instructed its own agent Brian Nelson to target innocent civilian Francisco Notarantonio instead in order to protect Scappaticci.[15]
In May 2006, Ingram accusedMartin McGuinness of being a double agent within the IRA, after sharing with the Irish media an alleged transcript of anintercepted phone call between agent codenamed "J118" and hisMI6 handler regarding an upcoming attack on a Britishmilitary checkpoint atCoshquin in October 1990.[16] Although he was not named on the actual transcript, Ingram claimed he was able verify the codename "J118" with confidential sources within the British government, who confirmed that was McGuinness's codename.[17] Ingram further alleged that McGuinness had vouched for and promoted an FRU agent named Frank Hegarty against the advice of other Republicans in Derry, so that Hegarty could reveal the location of several arms dumps ofLibyan-supplied weapons to his handlers in early 1986.[18] McGuinness denied Ingram's allegations,[19] and later raised a case with thePress Complaints Commission in relation to a newspaper article covering the story.[20]
In April 2023, Ingram alleged that Martin McGuinness had thwarted three separate internal IRA investigations into Freddie Scappaticci after he had come under suspicion of being a British agent. Ingram also claimed that Scappaticci had also tried to sue him personally for breaching what he deemed to be a "duty of care" in relation to outing him publicly as "Stakeknife".[21]
In a February 2025podcast series forThe Telegraph, Ingram accused his former commanding officer at the Force Research Unit,Gordon Kerr, of being a proud ScottishLoyalist who let his own bigotry towards Irish Catholic's cloud his judgement. Ingram also accused a former FRU colleague named Margaret Walshaw, who was Brian Nelson's handler,[22][23] of passing information to Nelson (such as photographs and vehicle registration numbers) to help plan assassinations.[24]
In later years, Ingram gave evidence to theSmithwick Tribunal, in which he claimed to have previously reviewed confidential British intelligence documents that identified Garda Owen Corrigan as a double agent for the IRA. Ingram testified that he first became aware of Garda Owen Corrigan from November 1987 onwards while working for the Force Research Unit nearEnniskillen. Ingram further alleged that his superior officer told him that Garda Owen Corrigan's contact for handing over information to the IRA was a covert double agent named "Stakeknife" (a.k.aFreddie Scappaticci).[3]
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