Red Hand Commando boss Winston ‘Winky’ Rea being quizzed over two sectarian murders
‘WAKING The Dead’ detectives have been granted an extra 80 hours to question Red Hand Commando leader Winky Rea.
The 65-year-old was arrested on Tuesday and is being questioned about the murders of Catholic men John Devine in July 1989 and John O’Hara in April 1991.
Officers from the Legacy Investigation Branch were granted the extension to quiz him about interviews Winston Churchill Rea gave as part of the Boston College history project.
Detective Inspector Neil NcGuinness, from Legacy Investigation Branch, said on Tuesday: “The 65-year-old man has been arrested in connection with the murders of John Benedict Devine in the Fallswater Street area of West Belfast on 23 July, 1989, and the murder of John Joseph Gerard O’Hara in the Dunluce Avenue area of South Belfast on 17 April, 1991.
“He has also been arrested in relation to a number of other serious crimes.
“The man was arrested in Belfast this afternoon and is currently helping police with their enquiries.”
Last year, police were given access to interviews he gave to a controversial American university project, the Boston College tapes.
Rea was among dozens of loyalists and republicans who provided testimonies to Boston College staff compiling an oral history of the Troubles.
In 1999, he was arrested on the morning of his daughter’s murder by detectives probing the murder of Red Hand Commando hitman Frankie Currie off the Shankill Road.
