Police in Northern Ireland have released fresh CCTV footage of a car used by gunmen who shot and seriously wounded DCI John Caldwell last month.
The footage shows a blue Ford Fiesta with false licence plates used by the suspected republican dissidents before the ambush at a sports complex in Omagh, County Tyrone, on 22 February.
Caldwell, who was shot several times in front of his son and other children, remains in a critical but stable condition in hospital.
The footage released on Wednesday coincided with an increased reward of £150,000 for information leading to the conviction of those responsible. The charity Crimestoppers said an anonymous donor enabled it to increase the original £20,000 offer.
The CCTV footage shows the Ford Fiesta, which had been fitted with false plates reading FRZ 8414. The car’s real registration was MGZ 6242. The New IRA claimed responsibility for the attack. Eight men who were detained and questioned have been released.
The investigation continues amid heightened concern over paramilitary activities in Northern Ireland.
Another republican dissident group, Arm na Poblachta, recently threatened police officers’ families. In a coded message to the Irish News, a Belfast daily newspaper, it said: “We are now looking at the families of PSNI [Police Service of Northern Ireland] officers as legitimate targets.”
Politicians and police representatives condemned the threat, which police chiefs said they were taking seriously. Linzi McLaren, a retired police officer, told the BBC it was a “new low” and could lead to resignations. “I think this threat is going to affect those very junior in service or those thinking of joining, or those at the very end of their career.”
In a separate incident, three masked men broke into a house in the Crocus Street area of west Belfast on Tuesday night and shot a man in his 20s in both knees and an ankle. He is being treated at hospital for serious injuries.
“The horrific violence that was inflicted on this man will most certainly leave physical and mental scars and trauma that may never heal,” said a police spokesperson.
Sinn Féin’s commemoration of former Provisional IRA members during the Troubles came under scrutiny at a Northern Ireland affairs committee hearing in Westminster on Wednesday.
Carla Lockhart, a Democratic Unionist party MP, said the attendance of Mary Lou McDonald and Michelle O’Neill at this week’s funeral of Rita O’Hare, who was wanted in Northern Ireland for allegedly attempting to murder a soldier, glorified terrorism. “The terrorism in 1983 is no different to terrorism today,” she said.
Chris Heaton-Harris, the Northern Ireland secretary, said the proper authority to deal with any such glorification was the Stormont assembly. A DUP boycott has paralysed the region’s power-sharing institutions.
