Police failed to properly deal with death threats made against Catholic solicitor Rosemary Nelson before she was murdered, a new report revealed today.
File photo dated from 1999 of Rosemary Nelson who died in a booby-trapped bombing of her car.
Northern Ireland Police Ombudsman Nuala O'Loan's investigation accused the RUC of an inadequate assessment of the risk facing the high-profile lawyer, and subsequent actions.
Abusive leaflets containing Mrs Nelson's personal details and an anonymous letter warning she was to be targeted - which were passed to the Northern Ireland Office months before she was killed by loyalists in March 1999 - were also never requested by police, the probe also found.
The Ombudsman's inquiry was carried out following complaints by the Belfast-based human rights group the Committee on the Administration of Justice over how police dealt with loyalist threats against Mrs Nelson.
As she presented her findings today, Mrs O'Loan said police should have made more strenuous efforts to establish a clearer picture of the level of risk and threat to Mrs Nelson, particularly given her profile at the time.
The Ombudsman declared: "They did not acknowledge the existence of the previous death threats, including two threats which were said to have come from police officers.
"Nor did they acknowledge a previous assessment in which Special Branch believed Mrs Nelson was at a 'degree of risk' and that police had taken 'some precautions.
"No individual officer had the responsibility for bringing together all these matters and making a risk and threat assessment based on all the available information.
"There were no systems in place at that time designed to ensure that information was captured and processed in that way." Mrs Nelson (40) a mother of three, was killed when a booby trap bomb exploded under the family's BMW car outside her home in Lurgan, Co Armagh.
The Red Hand Defenders, a cover name for the Ulster Defence Association and Loyalist Volunteer Force, later claimed responsibility for the attack.
Her murder is one of four controversial killings in Northern Ireland which are to be examined by public inquiries set up by the Government.
Mrs Nelson was a human rights lawyer who represented hundreds of Catholics and nationalists, including the Garvaghy Road residents involved in Portadown's Drumcree marching dispute which was at its height when the threats were issued.
With fears for her safety stretching back years before she was murdered, 20 incidents of concern had been outlined between October 1996 and September 1998. These included seven separate death threats, two of which were allegedly made by RUC officers, and the receipt of a bullet through the post.
They also included eleven separate occasions when Mrs Nelson was the subject of comments alleged to have been made by police officers, some of which were reported to have tried to link her to terrorism.
PA