Private Lee Clegg, now a lance-corporal, served four years of a life sentence after the death of teenager Karen Reilly at a Belfast roadblock in 1990. He was released on licence in 1995 but is continuing the fight to clear his name.

At the High Court in Belfast, his defence counsel said he was convicted on the strength of the opinion of a forensic expert and neither the prosecution nor the defence had ever carried out tests.

Anthony Scrivener QC said tests had now been carried out by the defence which would prove Clegg did not fire the fatal shot into the back of the car that killed Karen Reilly.



Lee Clegg: freed after four years

The fatal shooting

The shooting happened in the staunchly Republican area of Glen Road in west Belfast in 1990. Private Clegg, a member of the Parachute Regiment, was one of a 16-man patrol which was confronted by a stolen Vauxhall Astra car.

As two soldiers approached the car, it sped away, driving at the soldiers.

Orders were shouted to "Stop that car!" and all members of the patrol opened fire, including two other groups of soldiers further down the road.





Martin Peake: the driver who died at the scene

The soldiers said one of the patrol had been hit by the car but a police officer later testified that he saw one of the soldiers faking the injury.

The case was referred to the Director of Public Prosecutions, who marked it "no prosecution". But in July, 1991 the BBC's Panorama programme Lethal Force included the case as proof of what it claimed was a shoot-to-kill policy by the security forces.

Clegg was placed under close arrest a month later and charged with murder.





Riots in Belfast shortly after Clegg's release

It was claimed the first three shots he fired were acceptable but the fourth was "an unreasonable use of force". This shot, fired after the car had passed through the road block mounted by Clegg and his colleagues, was the basis for his conviction.

His appeals against conviction to the Court of Appeal and House of Lords were dismissed but he was released on licence in July 1995, a move which triggered widespread rioting in nationalist areas.