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Belfast — May 10, 2026: The public inquiry into the 1998 Omagh massacre is now weighing whether two dissident republican groups operated as one in planning and carrying out the attack, with senior counsel telling the panel that the evidence points to a coordinated "joint enterprise."
Lead counsel Paul Greaney KC opened the latest evidential phase of the Omagh Bombing Inquiry by setting out what he called a "working hypothesis": the Real IRA and the Continuity IRA both played organisational roles in the bombing. He described those involved as a small, disciplined cell of "experienced terrorists" who were careful to avoid capture.
The inquiry, chaired by Lord Turnbull, was established by the previous UK government to determine whether British authorities could have prevented the explosion. The current hearings, delayed by six months, are concentrating on the period surrounding the attack—how the plot came together, who directed it, and what security forces knew at the time.
The bombing on August 15, 1998, killed 29 people in the County Tyrone town of Omagh, including a woman who was pregnant with twins. More than 200 others were injured. It remains the deadliest single incident of the Troubles in Northern Ireland.
Greaney told the inquiry that mobile phone records and the suspects' use of telecommunications would form a key part of the evidence. He said the attack did not happen in isolation: the group behind it had been engaged in a violent campaign for months before the bombing and was determined to operate without detection.
"The inquiry legal team assesses that this violent dissident republican terrorist group did indeed play a key role in the attack," he said.
In the days after the bombing, responsibility for the attack was claimed in calls to journalists at RTÉ and the Irish News. Greaney said those claims matched other evidence indicating that the Real IRA was responsible. But, he added, "that is the start, not the end."
The inquiry's interest has now expanded to include a second group. Greaney referred to David Rupert, an informant for the FBI and MI5, who reported after the bombing that the operation had been described to him as a "joint operation" involving the Continuity IRA. The information, Greaney said, came from Michael McKevitt, a Real IRA leader who was later found civilly liable for the bombing.
The barrister then walked the inquiry through the logistics of the plot, beginning with the acquisition of the bomb car.
According to the inquiry's evidence, a Vauxhall Cavalier was stolen from Carrickmacross in County Monaghan in the early hours of August 13, 1998. Greaney said the theft had been carried out "effectively to order." Witnesses suggested that three other Cavaliers on or near the same street had also been tampered with that night.
The stolen car was taken shortly afterward to Dundalk, a border town that served as a hub for many of the people identified by the inquiry's legal team. One of those figures was Colm Murphy, who died in 2023 and had previously been found liable for the bombing in a civil case.
Greaney gave a stark assessment of Murphy's alleged role: "Evidence suggests that Colm Murphy sat like a spider at the centre of the web of the plan to detonate a bomb in Omagh."
The car was then handed to Seamus Daly, another man found liable in earlier civil proceedings, with the inquiry told it was "ready to be loaded with a bomb." Soon afterward, cloned number plates were fitted to the vehicle.
Greaney described this as standard dissident republican tradecraft in the late 1990s. A stolen car would be fitted with plates cloned from a legitimate vehicle of a similar make and model, reducing the chance that police systems would flag the vehicle as stolen.
"Those transporting bombs would wish to attract as little attention as possible," he said.
The inquiry also heard that there were "sound reasons" to believe Daly was in a scout car that led the bomb car into Omagh on the day of the attack. Séamus McKenna, who is now dead, was reportedly in the vehicle carrying the bomb. Using two cars gave the team a faster escape route.
This phase of the inquiry is expected to include a pre-recorded witness statement from a senior Garda officer about the theft of the car. Cross-border cooperation has been one of the most sensitive parts of the investigation, with victims' families repeatedly pressing the Irish authorities to share all available material.
Michael Gallagher, whose son Aiden died in the attack, said the final days before the bombing deserve close scrutiny.
"This was a cross-border crime and most of the evidential opportunities lie within the Republic," Gallagher said. "We welcome the fact that the gardaí are engaging and co-operating with the inquiry. We just hope in the end we will get truth and dignity out of this process."
Claire Hayes, whose brother Alan Radford was killed, said the latest hearings had been a "long time coming."
"This chapter is a pivotal point in the inquiry process," Hayes said. "We are now 28 years past the bomb and there has been very little engagement from the south of Ireland. I want them to pass on all the knowledge they have."
The joint-enterprise theory is significant because it could reshape public understanding of how the Omagh attack was managed. Rather than a single faction acting alone, the evidence, at least as outlined by counsel, points to coordination between two groups that were often described separately.
The inquiry is also testing how intelligence supplied by sources like Rupert was handled by British, Irish and US agencies. Rupert had access to senior republican figures, and his reporting after the bombing influenced judgments about which group was responsible. That gives the case a distinctive international angle for US readers, particularly around informant reliability and cross-border intelligence sharing.
No individual has been convicted in a criminal court specifically for the Omagh bombing, although several men have been held liable in civil proceedings, including McKevitt, Murphy and Daly. The inquiry is independent of those cases and is not a criminal trial, but its findings could carry weight with future legal actions.
The latest hearings mark a shift from the earlier, deeply emotional accounts of survivors and bereaved families to a more forensic examination of the plot. The inquiry is expected to continue in Belfast over the coming weeks, with more operational detail to come on the bomb car, the senior Garda evidence and the communications trail left by the terrorists.
Greaney said those behind the attack were highly experienced and focused on evading arrest. The task now, he suggested, is to establish precisely how their plan was organized—and whether the "joint enterprise" model holds up under scrutiny.
His words echoed what the families have long argued: that the search for truth about Omagh is far from complete. As Gallagher put it, the process must now deliver "truth and dignity." The hearings will determine whether that expectation is met.
