The PSNI was able to confirm suspicions that the Provisional IRA was behind the Northern Bank raid when they monitored and taped telephone conversations between some of the main suspects who fell for a hoax report that stolen money had turned up at the Dundonald ice rink, Belfast.
According to a Garda source, the PSNI leaked information that some notes from the £26.5 million taken in the Northern Bank raid had turned up at Dundonald International Ice Bowl in the hope it would cause their main suspects in the PIRA to start talking among themselves.
According to the source, the PSNI already had a number of Provisional IRA suspects in mind as being behind the robbery and they put in place a sophisticated series of surveillance and monitoring systems to see if the hoax report would prompt any reaction from their suspects.
It's understood that the report of the money turning up at the Dundonald International Ice Bowl prompted a spate of phonecalls among some of the PSNI's main suspects, confirming police suspicions.
