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12 years; died in prison in 1980. Giuseppe Conlon had travelled from Belfast to help his son, Gerry Conlon, in the Guildford Four trial. Conlon, who had troubles with his lungs for many years, died in prison in January 1980, while the other six served their sentences and were released.
Gerard Patrick Conlon (1 March 1954 – 21 June 2014) was a Northern Irish man known for being one of the Guildford Four who spent 15 years in prison after being wrongly convicted of being a Provisional IRA bomber.
- Paul Hill – The First Man Arrested For The Bombing
- The Trial's Judge Handed Hill A Life Sentence
- An Active Ira Unit Confessed to The Bombings
- Hill Was Moved from Prison to Prison
- Corbyn Campaigned For The Four's Release
- The Pogues Penned Song About The Four
- Soviet Support For The Four Left Thatcher Enraged
- Hill Married Into The Kennedy Family
- An Oscar-Nominated Film Was Released Four Years After The Men's Release
- It Took 26 Years For Them to Receive An Official Apology
Paul Hill was arrested November 29, 1974 his friend Gerry Conlon (pictured above) was arrested November 30 and their old Belfast school mate Paddy Armstrong and his English girlfriend Carole Richardson were arrested on December 3.
At their trial, Paul Hill was given what was, at the time, the longest sentence ever handed down by an English court; life with no chance of parole until great age or infirmity. The judge's chief regret was that he couldn't hang the three men.
In January 1977, an active IRA service unit, nicknamed the Balcombe Street gang, issued a statement in court confessing they carried out the Guildford and Woolwich bombings and that the Four were completely innocent.
Paul Hill was ‘ghosted’ more than 50 times during his 15 years in prison. ‘Ghosted’ is when a prisoner is moved without warning to another prison, usually in the middle of the night.
Jeremy Corbyn was a guest at Paul’s wedding to his American girlfriend inside Long Lartin prison. Corbyn was a tireless campaigner to free the Guildford Four and Birmingham Six. The Sunstory on the morning of the wedding was labelled ‘IRA Pig To Wed’.
The Pogues song, Street Of Sorrow/Birmingham Six, about both the Guildford Four and the Birmingham Six, was banned under the same legislation used in the late 1980s to stop the broadcast of direct interviews with members of Sinn Fein.
In the late 1980s it was reported that Soviet President Mikhail Gorbachev brought up the campaign to free the Guildford Four in a private meeting with PM Margaret Thatcher. Maggie was not pleased.
Paul Hill married Courtney Kennedy, daughter of the late Bobby Kennedy and niece of the late John F Kennedy. The couple lived in America and on the west coast of Ireland and have a daughter. They divorced ten years ago.
In The Name Of The Father,the 1993 film made about this miscarriage of justice, with Daniel Day-Lewis as Gerry Conlon and John Lynch as Paul Hill, was nominated for seven Oscars.
The Four would have to wait another 16 years after being freed, until 2005, for an apology; when then PM Tony Blair said sorry to the Four and the Maguire Seven. Update: The play Your Ever Lovingfeatured and won Best play of Edinburgh Fringe 2017 . ** Originally Published on: Apr 11, 2016
- Irish Post
Each of them were sentenced to between 4 and 14 years in prison for their alleged role in the killings-- Giuseppe passed away in the third year of his unjust incarceration. The Guildford four, meanwhile, were sentenced to life.
22 October 1975 - Paul Hill, Gerry Conlon, Patrick Armstrong and Carole Richardson - the Guildford Four - jailed for life at the Old Bailey. 19 October 1989 - After years of campaigning, the...
Aug 5, 2021 · The Suicide Squad. Supervillains Harley Quinn, Bloodsport, Peacemaker, and a collection of nutty cons at Belle Reve prison join the super-secret, super-shady Task Force X as they are dropped off at the remote, enemy-infused island of Corto Maltese.
The Guildford Four - as they were dubbed - were jailed for life in 1975 for bombing pubs in Guildford. The attacks left five people dead and over 100 injured. Paul Hill and Patrick Armstrong were...
