Four Shots in the Night, Part 1: The Man From Derry | Northern Ireland
59:29 Share

Hello, this is Matt and McKinley from History Dispatches. We are the father-son duo bringing you the weird, the wild, the wacky, and the craziest tales from across time. From the Ice Bowl to the Great Heathen Army and the head of Oliver Cromwell. The same head they kept on a pike for three years? Yep, all here on History Dispatches. New episodes every weekday. Find out more at HistoryDispatches.com or wherever you get your podcast app. Hello, True Spies listeners.

Today, we're celebrating the fifth anniversary of the True Spies podcast. Firstly, we'd like to thank the amazing people who shared their stories and expertise with us over these last few years. And we'd like to thank you, the listener, for your passion for the world of secrets, shadows, and storytelling. We couldn't do it without you.

As ever, if you'd like to support the podcast directly, you can subscribe to Spyscape Plus to hear episodes a week early and ad-free. You'll also be able to access exclusive bonus content. Subscribe at plus.spyscape.com. This is

What do they know?

What are their skills? And what would you do in their position? I'm Rhianna Needs, and this is True Spies from Spyscape Studios. Four Shots in the Night, Part One. The Man from Derry. The story begins with an ending. So it's the middle of the night, and it's the summer of 1986. And we're in the borderlands of Northern Ireland.

The pale headlights of a car cut through the dark. Shadowy figures step out of the front seats into the night. Then a rear passenger door is opened. There's a man who has masking tape over both of his eyes. His hands recently were tied together, they were bound, but they've been cut so his hands are now loose, they're free. And he's helped out of the back of a vehicle.

With his eyes taped closed, the man takes a few unsteady steps. Perhaps he reaches out for support. He's then taken to a border crossing, but there's nobody at this border crossing. So it's a border crossing that consists only of a series of concrete bollards that simply prevent vehicles from going by. As the men step beyond the bollards...

They enter the Republic of Ireland. They continue for another half mile up the road, and we know that it was raining very lightly that particular night. We also know that this is the middle of the country, and there would have been no lights from nearby towns. It would have been extremely dark. As he stumbles along the path, the man considers his situation. He knows that the people around him have told him that he's going to be taken home, but what he doesn't know is whether he can trust them.

So he's certainly been told it's all right. The ordeal you've been through is over and you're safe. But he also knows that the people he's with have a history of saying things like that to people before they then kill them. Still, he clings on to those words of reassurance. They are all he can hold onto in the dark. After a few minutes of walking, we don't know the exact details of how it happened. This man, we cannot see where he's going.

is stopped. - With his eyes still covered, the man is unable to see as the gun is lifted and pointed directly at him. The next morning, the man's body is discovered where it fell, by a local farmer. Tape still covers his eyes. - Very soon after this murder becomes news, a rumor goes around that the person who was killed was a British spy.

A detail that is both extraordinary and, during this particular chapter of history, somehow routine. Throughout the course of The Troubles, there were many people who were accused of being spies and then killed. And when you look at The Troubles as a whole, as a 30-year-long conflict, of course, there are many people who died in this way. And at the same time, it's still a big deal when it happens. It's still traumatic for people

Tens, if not hundreds of people who either knew the victim or read about it or are close in some way to the events. Still, there is a reason why this story begins with this particular ending and not one of the countless others that resemble it in so many ways.

What sets this particular murder apart is the rumour that will later circulate that the man who carried out this killing might have also been a British spy. The possibility of two British spies, one on either side of the gun, brought together by the cruel machinery of fate. If such a rumour were true, it would represent the most egregious failure of the intelligence services responsible for them.

And this is something that will lead to one of the largest murder investigations in British history, one that costs millions of pounds, would involve as many as 72 detectives working for over seven years, looking into not just this murder, but a series of other murders also associated with this one British spy.

That investigation is many years away from where we stand, on a dark, damp road in the middle of the night in May of '86. But make no mistake, with the crack of those gunshots, a scandal has opened like a sinkhole in the Irish soil. Over the years to come, it will grow bigger and bigger, pulling those who come near it into its pit, refusing to be contained. And one day, when it reaches critical mass,

The truth will come out. My name's Henry Hemming, and I'm the author of seven non-fiction books, including most recently Four Shots in the Night, which is a story of murder, espionage, and a particular undercover agent called State Knife.

Few spies in modern history have captured the popular imagination, or indeed the front pages of the UK and Ireland's newspapers, so decisively as the British agent known as Stakenife.

In recent years, an investigation has laid bare the extent of the damage that one rogue agent, acting with impunity, might cause. There's good evidence that he was involved in as many as 14 murders and abductions. And this is part of the price that some people felt it was okay to pay in return for his intelligence. The investigation into Stakenife's activity will have dizzying ethical implications.

Because just where exactly does the buck stop when a man murders over and over while acting covertly on the behalf of the British government? For Henry Hemming, there are no easy answers to such conundrums. All he can do is tell you the story of four shots in the night, a story of two British agents and how their destinies became entwined one night in 1986.

From there, you'll have to draw your own conclusions. Let's begin, why don't we, with another rural tableau, one separated from that fateful night by six years and a season. So it's just before dawn on a winter's day in 1980, and there's a man called Frank Hegarty who is out walking his dog on a lane outside Derry, also known as London Derry, in Northern Ireland.

This route is well trodden by Frank Hegarty and his prized racing greyhound, Blue. Together, they walk it at the same time each morning. And yet this morning is different. The sun is somewhere behind the clouds beginning to come up and he notices ahead of him another person walking their dog. And what's interesting is that he probably thinks to himself, I think I've seen this person before. This same pair have been on Frank's route a few times in the last weeks.

He has glimpsed their silhouettes from afar. They know it's spoken, and Frank has never seen this man's face. But as Frank continues to walk, he notices the distance between him and this other figure is getting smaller. Also possibly notices that the road is quieter than usual that day. So usually there'd be a van or a car rumbling past every few minutes, but this time there's nothing. Come to think of it, something feels strange about this whole scene.

The walker ahead is barely even moving. He keeps walking and he gets to the point where this other figure with their dog is now so close that it'd be weird if they didn't have a conversation. And then the man ahead of him turns around and he looks at Frank. And Frank knows in that moment they have not met. And yet the stranger looks Frank in the eye and says, all right, Franco,

It's with those words that Frank Hegarty knows that something strange is well and truly afoot. Frank Hegarty is someone who's lived in Derry all of his life. And he's known to his mum as Frankie, he's known to the local priest as Francis, but to most of his friends, most of the people he's out drinking with or things like that, he's known as Franco. When Frank Hegarty set out on his walk, earlier that morning in February of 1980...

He did so as just another normal man from Derry. So Franco is someone who used to be a lorry driver. He's a key figure in the local greyhound community. He is a dad. His partner is just about to give birth to another child of his. And I guess one of the things that sets him apart is that not only is he Catholic, as most people in Derry are, but his partner is someone who's Protestant. And by this time in the Troubles, that's unusual.

When it comes to food and drink, true spies make all sorts of sacrifices. It's not all three martini lunches, you know. But you don't have to be undercover to know that it's not always easy to stay healthy, happy, and hydrated. That's where Aquatrue comes in.

From portable, affordable water filters that sit right there on your countertop to high-capacity under-sink varieties, AquaTrue has you covered against more than 80 of the chemical nasties that affect most American homes. Its proprietary purification technology is independently tested and has been proven to remove dangerous contaminants, including chlorine, arsenic, nitrate, and PFAs, also known as forever chemicals.

And when one set of filters makes the equivalent of 4,500 bottles of water, you'll save the environment from tons of plastic waste too. The fact that pure, aqua-true water tastes amazing is just the cherry on top. Tea and coffee is so much better.

I can't wait to find out what it does to my soups, pasta and veggies. And if you're not totally satisfied, AquaTrue comes with a 30-day money-back guarantee. Today, True Spies listeners get 20% off any AquaTrue water purifier when you go to AquaTrue.com. That's A-Q-U-A-T-R-U dot com. And use promo code TRUESPIES at checkout. The Troubles

Such a gentle term for something so vast and so painful. At this point, in 1980, that one little word already contains a decade-long history.

The period begins in the late 1960s. For me, the best way to think about the start of the Troubles is to imagine three separate conflicts that all combine to create this uber-conflict in some ways. It begins with a civil rights movement and begins with young women

working class people in Northern Ireland, mostly Catholic, but also many Protestants, who begin to organize demonstrations and peaceful protests. And they're trying to achieve one very simple thing. It's not for Northern Ireland to be part of the Republic of Ireland. It's for there to be an end to discrimination against Catholics in Northern Ireland. One of the loudest voices calling for change is that of the Irish Republican Army, or IRA.

At this stage, they are primarily a political body, organizing protests.

It's in the reaction to those protests that you have the second element of this conflict. So the reaction to this from the mostly Protestant police force is an exaggerated one, it's over the top, it's heavy-handed. And this leads to conflict, this leads to street battles, this leads to people being hurt. But it also leads to a sense for a lot of people within the Catholic community that peaceful protest just is not going to work.

You begin in December of 1969 to have Protestant families living in Catholic neighbourhoods and Catholic families living in Protestant neighbourhoods being forced out of their homes. And there becomes a new desire within the region for some neighbourhoods to be entirely Protestant or entirely Catholic. And this leads to deaths, this leads to injuries. And you have a sectarian conflict which emerges.

Catholics and Protestants warring over the neighbourhoods they once shared. This, in itself, is a fraught situation. But it's in the response to that that you get the third part of the troubles. And the response from the Northern Irish government is, we can't handle this. We don't have the resources. So the message is sent over to London, to the government there, that the British army needs to come in. And this is sort of easy to forget. This is a really strange request.

The last time the British Army policed its own streets was in the 1920s. As such, they are entirely unprepared for the task that faces them. And yet, in the early days of deployment, in 1969, their presence seems to have the desired pacifying effect. And to start with, the violence subsides, the deaths stop. And several months after the soldiers first appear, some people think this has been a success.

But out of sight, there's a darker picture beginning to emerge. And there's the emergence of a new branch of the IRA, the Provisional IRA, which is committed in a more violent way to removing a British presence from Northern Ireland. Where their forebearers had believed in a peaceful solution to the problems facing Catholics in Northern Ireland, the Provisional IRA saw no solution other than violence.

And this is really where you get the third element of the troubles, which is an insurgency. So you have the British Army, but you also have the IRA that's willing to do anything to get them out. So if you mix these three things together, a civil rights movement, a sectarian conflict and an insurgency, you have the makings of a conflict that really could run and run almost indefinitely. The provisional IRA's membership swells.

so much so that they supersede the earlier, more passively inclined iteration of the group, which rebrands itself as the "official IRA". From this point on, when people talk about the IRA, they are referring to the "provisional IRA".

Over the years that follow, the troubles cycle through a few distinct phases. If you want to look at the shape of the troubles, it begins in 1969. There's a huge intensity of fighting and the number of deaths grows and grows and grows up until about 1972. And then things begin to ease off. And by the late 1970s, by let's say 1977, 1978, 70s,

Some people think peace is in sight. Some people think this is all beginning to just die out of its own accord. But within the IRA, there's a shift. So there's a new strategy and it's called the Long War Strategy. And this is basically a new approach to how to win this insurgency.

And it's one which will involve fewer members of the IRA, but working in a way that's essentially more efficient from the IRA's point of view. This leads to a spate of bombings, assassinations and attacks. By the time Frank Hegarty finds himself talking to a stranger at dawnbreak in early 1980, the IRA's new long war campaign has reached a fever pitch.

Attacks are taking place with dreadful regularity, not only on the contested Northern Irish soil, but also in England.

The government in London is much more worried about this. And part of the response from certainly Thatcher and the people around her was to think, right, we need a new solution. This is not working. Whatever it is we've been doing up until now, we need to try something else. And at the heart of their new response to the troubles in Northern Ireland is a desire to try and end this using intelligence. This shift in strategy, mandated from the very top of British government...

comes with the creation of an entirely new unit of the British Army in Northern Ireland. One focused on running agents in the region and rapidly multiplying sources of intelligence. Its name is the FRU, or Force Research Unit. And the dog walker who has turned to greet Frank Hegarty on his morning stroll? He belongs to that unit. The question is, why is a man like Frank Hegarty in his sights?

Frank's relationship to the IRA at this point is one of being aware of it, of knowing people who are in it, but he very much is not a member of the IRA. He's on the periphery. He'll have a friend who knows a friend. He'll hear about some of the things that are happening, but he's not on the inside.

And he's also not the kind of person you can imagine becoming part of the IRA. His partner is Protestant. He's in his 40s. He is not someone you can imagine running around hijacking cars or planting bombs or getting caught up in gunfights with the local police or indeed the army. He doesn't also have that kind of pure commitment to the cause that you so often see in IRA volunteers at around this time.

So why go through all this trouble for someone very much on the outside of the IRA? The reason why they approached him is that they just needed more sources. They needed more agents. And given they were trying so many different people, they thought, why not have a go? I still remember a conversation I had with someone who had inside knowledge of how this process works. And he said to me something like, you've got to understand that nine out of 10 approaches in the world of intelligence end in failure.

In other words, throw enough spaghetti at the wall and something is bound to stick. And yet there is one reason why a gamble on Frank Hegarty just might pay off. There was a moment earlier in Frank's life, back in the early 1970s, when he joined one branch of the IRA. So that was the official IRA, which was very different to the provisional IRA. So their idea was...

They wanted to begin by bringing together working-class people from both Protestant and Catholic background, and only having achieved that, then go about trying to unite the island of Ireland. And they didn't have the same kind of belief in a violent or military solution to the troubles until that political shift had come about. But Frank was briefly a part of this, and during that time he came to know Martin McGuinness.

In the years since Frank's dalliance with the Republican movement, Martin McGuinness had grown to become one of the most senior leaders in the Provisional IRA, one of the architects of its new long war campaign. Here was a man that British intelligence was desperate to keep tabs on, and Frank knew him.

There was an element of trust between these two guys. And I think there's also a similarity in terms of their lives, in terms of their backgrounds. Both came from Catholic families. Both had grown up with an Amali of each other. Martin McGuinness was a little bit younger than Frank, but they came from similar types of families. Neither man's parents belonged to the IRA.

Neither one had grown up in a household hearing stories of uncles or aunts or grandparents who'd been part of an early version of the IRA. So in many ways, for each of these people to become involved in any way in the IRA during the Troubles was something of a break from what they were used to. That shared outsider's perspective formed the basis of an easy acquaintanceship.

No one would have described Martin and Frank as best friends, but it was something. And so, perhaps it's not so hard to see why the FRU would target Frank Hegarty on his morning stroll. As that stranger turned to greet him, calling him by his nickname, Frank quite quickly understood the nature of this encounter. This was not the first time a handler had made a play for him.

And the first approach did not work. The first approach was by someone from MI5, and for various reasons, Frank was not interested. He didn't like the sound of this person. He just continued to walk. But this time...

Something makes Frank listen to the stranger. The second time round, it was a man with a dog. It was a man who sounded different, who came from Liverpool, who had a sort of more familiar and slightly more welcoming accent and way of being. But it was also someone who knew a lot more about Frank. And I think that was part of the reason why he was willing to listen. There's also a chance that after that first approach, the idea of maybe working with the British had time to sink in.

Of course, Frank understands some of the dangers of being caught collaborating with the British Army. But at this juncture of the troubles,

the full extent of that danger is not yet common knowledge. By the time Frank was approached, there were only rumours about this new IRA unit called the Nutting Squad that had the job of hunting down spies inside the IRA and torturing them and then killing them. That story hadn't really taken root yet.

And up until then, there were other stories of people who'd been found out to be spies who would just disappear, i.e. they'd go and live somewhere else. They were told they had 24 hours to leave the region. So, yes, it was a huge risk. And at the same time, Frank would have known stories of people who had taken that risk and had got away with it. All of this plays on his mind as he listens to the scouser make his case.

Frank is told that the reason the path is so quiet this morning is because an unmarked army van has blocked its entrance, affording the two an opportunity to talk in privacy. On cue, that vehicle now pulls up alongside them. And this van contains some of the army handler's colleagues. They're also dressed as civilians, but a couple of them are armed.

And this is the moment where suddenly there's pressure on the situation. In other words, the army handler says to Frank, "We've got to decide. Either you step in the van with me now and we continue the conversation, or you stay where you are." Frank peers into the open door of the van and sees nothing less than an entire parallel future open up before him. If he walks away now, he can return to the quiet family life that he loves.

Or he can jump in. And Frank thinks about it. He, for reasons we may never precisely know, he decides to hop into the back of the van. It's early 1980 and Frank Hegarty has agreed to provide intelligence to the British Army. Quite quickly, his quiet life in Derry is punctuated by a new routine. What would happen is that once every week or once every two weeks, he would have a meeting with his handler.

And what would happen is that they'd have a series of prearranged locations. But what Frank would have is what's called a moving meet. So he'd have a stretch of land or the side of a road that he needed to walk along. And sometimes this could be a mile long. And he'd know that as long as he was walking along that particular bit of land at a given time, then an army vehicle would come in the opposite direction, slow down,

The door would open in the back and just as it got to Frank, Frank would hop in and then they'd drive off. Perhaps it sounds brazen, but there was naturally a method to the madness. Also, there'd be a cover vehicle which would be providing support just in case this turned out to be a trap, just in case this agent or Frank had been compromised in some way. And then this disguised army vehicle with the cover car in support...

would take a sort of unbelievably circuitous route to get to the Handler. So doing all sorts of things like going round and round about quite a few times, stopping, doing three-point turns, doubling back on itself, going through parts of the region that maybe you wouldn't expect to be followed through. And eventually they'd meet either in the main army base in Derry or perhaps in a safe house somewhere nearby. Frank would get out of the vehicle and then his Handler would be waiting for him and they would have a chat.

And what was the nature of the material that Frank handed over during these elaborate meetings?

What his handler wanted from Frank was any interesting bits of information that he might have picked up. But what would also happen is often the handler would give Frank a couple of specific questions. So he'd say to him, look, Frank, over the next week or couple of weeks, I'd like to see if you can find out this or that. And sometimes these questions would have come to the handler from his immediate superior. Sometimes they're passed on by someone from MI5. At the end of his meeting, the handler would slip Frank an envelope.

His reward for all that risk. Frank would be paid a small amount of money. One of the payments early on was for £25, so it's not a fortune, but it's some pocket money. He can spend that on his dogs. Hardly life-changing sums, but then it was plain for his handlers to see that this was never about money for Frank Hegarty.

What's interesting is that one of the people who was close to this particular recruitment later said that the thing that surprised him most about this whole episode was how, I suppose, ideologically motivated Frank was. What I mean by that is that Frank had a desire...

to make things better. He wanted the violence to end. He wanted the bombings to cease. He wanted the murders to stop. And this was something which I think every agent handler hopes will be part of the motivation for the person they're approaching. Let's leave Frank where he is for a moment, stepping out of an unmarked van in some quiet corner of Derry where no one knows his name. It's time to visit another part of this troubled region,

and to meet another pawn in this complex game. It's early 1977 and we're in a police station in Belfast. And what's just happened is that a series of local men have been rounded up by some soldiers nearby.

And they're taken in for something called a screening. And a screening is one where a series of people are just asked one by one questions about things they've heard, rumors about local IRA commanders, stuff like that. And this is fairly routine. And from a local point of view, it was known as something that the Brits would do to try and just get more information, gather intelligence.

In other words, it's seen by locals as a desperate crapshoot for crumbs of intelligence. But appearances can be deceiving. What they didn't know is that it was also a way for the Brits to secretly speak to some of their agents. So they would include some of their agents in this roundup, this seemingly random selection of people, which was in fact not random at all.

One of the people who's in this group on this particular day is a man called Freddy Scappaticci.

A name that carries quite a reputation in certain parts of Belfast. Freddie Scappaticci is someone who used to belong to the IRA. He's recently been kicked out. He's someone who was interned earlier in the Troubles. Someone who has quite a track record. He's also someone who's a fairly terrifying figure. He's got a reputation in the markets area of Belfast, which is where he lives. And he's seen as a hard man. And he enjoys that reputation.

On the surface of things, Freddy Scappaticci is a dyed-in-the-wool Republican, just about the last person you'd expect to be talking to the police. But here he is working as a police informant, but he is not supplying information about the IRA. What he's doing instead is he's just supplying information about people in the building trade that he works in who are taking part in a VAT scam, so people who are fiddling their tax returns, essentially.

Scappaticci had himself been caught cooking the books and informing on his colleagues was offered as an alternative to more jail time. And I think to him, this probably seems like something which is pretty minor. He's not breaking the big taboo within the IRA, which is that you never speak to the police or the army or to MI5.

By now, Scappaticci is used to these routine roundups, the covert interviews, the rhythm of his secret exchanges with the police. But on this day, something is different. So Freddy Scappaticci is speaking to his police handler. He's passing on some details, presumably, about fellow builders and some of the rumors he might have heard. And then the police handler says there's someone that he wants Freddy to meet.

And into the room walks a third man. The man's name is Peter. He introduces himself as a soldier. And he and Freddie begin to speak. And very soon it becomes clear that they're hitting it off. A friendship is starting to form. And Freddie probably thinks nothing more of it. Peter leaves without making the slightest request of Freddie. But already a bond has started to form.

Over the weeks and months that follow, the soldier makes sure that he bumps into Freddy Scappaticci again and again. And eventually he plucks up the courage to suggest to Freddy that they go off and get a drink together. Perhaps that sounds like a risk-free proposition. But at this stage in the troubles, it's anything but.

There's a story that this soldier knows extremely well of somebody called Robert Nairak, who only a few weeks previously went to a pub in South Armagh and we believe he was there to try and recruit another agent. He used a fake Northern Irish accent and something went wrong during the night and his cover was blown. He was then taken away, he was interrogated and he was murdered.

Peter knows that stepping away from the safety of the police station to court Freddie is extremely dangerous. He also knows that it's his best shot. Peter's prepared to take this risk. He thinks there's something in the friendship he's begun to develop with Freddie Scappaticci, something that could develop. So they agree to go and have a drink.

Peter makes sure it's in neutral territory. It's not in a Catholic neighborhood. It's not somewhere where Scappaticci would be recognized. And he also makes sure not to, in that conversation, essentially say, hey, how about you come and work for me? Instead, he keeps the conversation light and tries to just talk about stuff that they have in common. They talk about women. They talk about football. They talk about music.

The more Freddie finds out about Peter, the more he seems like someone that Freddie can trust. He's someone who's not your typical soldier. He's someone who was in Northern Ireland before the Troubles. He's someone who has married a local model. He's someone who was such a part of the music scene back then that he actually got to know Van Morrison, who was then an up-and-coming young star. So this is a guy with genuine charisma.

And this is a guy who has a lighter take on life to some of his colleagues. He's not a typical soldier. And Scappaticci seems to like him. They get on. This dance is the most delicate thing.

Peter dares not even tell his superiors in the army for fear of jinxing the entire endeavour. But as the friendship grows, Peter begins to realise that he could use Scappaticci as an agent. And eventually they get to a point where Peter asks Freddie if this is OK. And then they've almost gone beyond the point of no return. And Scappaticci starts to supply information to the British.

In the case of Frank Hegarty's recruitment, a few years later, in 1980, a sense of ethical imperative will play no small part. But for Freddy Scappaticci, there's another reason he's prepared to get into bed with the British.

The number one thing that I would say, I was asked, what was his motivation? What was he thinking? Why would he even dream of beginning to work for the army? And for some people, it's money. For some people, it's other things. For me, in terms of what I've heard, it's about revenge. Freddie Scappaticci had once known the thrill of being in the inner fold of the IRA. It had been a badge of honour for him.

But just recently, after sounding off about some of the senior figures in his area, he had been beaten up and unceremoniously kicked out of the organisation, humiliated by the same group he had given his life to. Uppermost in his mind is the fact that he has been not only kicked out of the IRA, but he was beaten up by people in the IRA that he used to order around. He wants to get back at these people. He wants to get his revenge. And look, there are different ways of doing that.

he could just try and hurt them. But by working as a spy against them, by receiving money, by doing this without anyone finding out, it's a very different form of revenge and it's one that obviously appealed to him at a certain level. So there's a kind of superiority that comes from that as he can start to make sure that certain IRA operations are a failure, make sure these people who humiliated him are

are either ending up in jail or being embarrassed themselves. So this, I think, is the number one motivation. It might not be the most altruistic of motives, but for a handler like Peter, an agent's motivation will only ever be of secondary concern. What can he offer? That's more important. And on this front, Freddy Scappaticci is highly promising.

So Freddie's most attractive quality from the perspective of the Brits, from the perspective of Peter and everyone else who's involved in running him, is the fact that he has a really close friendship with Gerry Adams. Gerry Adams is another of the Provisional IRA's most senior leaders. Another of the men responsible for shaping the strategy and direction of the organisation.

Freddie got to know him while they were both interned at Long Kesh Prison. And in the years since, the two have remained close. And what happens as Freddie begins to supply information to Peter is they realize that Freddie is having these regular conversations with Jerry Adams. And they're often, because Jerry Adams was security conscious and was deeply worried about

anything that he said being overheard or being passed on to the British, they'd only ever talk in Scappaticci's car. So he felt that was the one place that he was safe. And once this was clear, what the British did was insert a series of microphones into Scappaticci's car so they could get these apparently high-quality recordings of Gerry Adams talking to Scappaticci about everything.

about his life, about the future of the IRA, about operations that were taking place, things like that. So this became a really valuable source of intelligence.

During this phase of the Troubles, there are two distinct types of intelligence. The first is what's known as tactical intelligence. So the tactical stuff is details of a bomb that's going to go off, details of an attack that's about to take place. And that usually is passed on to the army or the police. Tactical intelligence is enormously important in the day-to-day battle against the violence.

It stops bombs going off or assassinations from happening. It saves lives. But in the grand scheme of things, it's treating the symptoms of the troubles and not the cause.

If you want to treat the cause, you'll need strategic intelligence. And this is the kind of stuff that's harder to act on right away, but it's the kind of information that could accelerate the end of the troubles. This is stuff about what's going on in the upper echelons of the IRA and Sinn Féin. Sinn Féin being the political wing of the IRA.

To understand what takes place behind closed doors amongst the organisation's leadership is to peer into the crystal ball of Northern Ireland's future. What is Gerry Adams thinking? What's his relationship like with Martin McGuinness? Is someone about to oust them? Are they really starting to move towards peace? These are the kinds of questions that were absolutely essential to the British in terms of how they could find a way out of this, in terms of how they could see a political solution on the horizon.

In Westminster, a realisation is slowly dawning. Occupation and suppression are not working. The more the British Army struggles to contain the violence, the stronger Republican sentiment grows. If the troubles are to come to an end, then there will need to be figures inside the IRA that the British government is able to negotiate with. They need to work out which leaders of the IRA to back Britain.

And I use that word cautiously. You know, if you're backing someone, it suggests you're kind of supplying them with money or resources. But I suppose the best way to explain that word back is which people would they most like to have running the IRA, given that someone has to be running it? And I think early on in the 1980s, there's a realisation that

in parts of MI5, that McGuinness and Adams seem to be the two people within the IRA who are most likely to eventually lead this organisation towards a peaceful political solution. That realisation puts a very high premium on any intelligence that can illustrate the motivations and thinkings of both Gerry Adams and Martin McGuinness.

Any agent with inroads to one of these two figures must be encouraged at any cost. So once the relationship between Freddy Scappaticci and his hander Peter has become fairly developed and they've got into something of a routine, that's when Peter suggests to Scappaticci that he rejoins the IRA.

And obviously this is a huge risk. It's a huge risk because there's a very good chance that Scappatici could be found out by the IRA. And there's also a tiny chance that Scappatici has never really left the IRA. Maybe Peter is the one who's being played. Maybe there's a double agent situation going on here. So there are many risks from the British point of view, but there are also huge risks from Scappatici's point of view.

Chief amongst them, the risk of exposure. Scappaticci knows enough of the IRA to know what will happen to him if he's caught. He will be handed over to the Nutting Squad.

the unit responsible for torturing and executing spies. And yet he was willing to do this. He liked the idea of getting back on the inside, having the local status and power that comes with being part of the IRA within his neighbourhood, but also having the status and power that comes from having a close relationship with the British. And so that's what he does.

Freddy Scappaticci returns to the IRA with his tail between his legs and asks to rejoin. He is welcomed back into the fold. It's a turn of events that will find an echo just a few years later, 70 miles away in Derry.

It's now 1984, and Frank Hegarty seems to have settled into his new life as an agent. He's now had another child, so he's a father of three kids. He's living with his partner in Chantala, which is part of Derry. And he seems happy. He seems set. He's having regular meetings with his handler. There have been no slip-ups, no mistakes, nothing which has caused him to come under suspicion. And then something changes.

Frank's handler calls him in for his routine meeting, where Frank expects to hand over the crumbs of intelligence he's managed to collect at the racecourse or in the pub, just like always. And during this meeting, his handler says they would like him to join the IRA. They'd also like him to get close to the most powerful figure within the local IRA, which is Martin McGuinness. And the story that's told is that when Frank first heard this, his response was, what are you smoking? Frank is a father.

Well into his 40s, his brief flirtation with the official IRA is long behind him. The idea of him suddenly infiltrating the IRA now is quite literally laughable. This is such an outlandish idea. He can hardly imagine it's real. And at the same time, he agrees to go and think about it. He goes away. He weighs up the pros and the cons. Of which there are too many to even itemize. But here's the thing about Frank Hegarty.

The man spends his life on racetracks, betting on dogs...

He is a gambler by instinct. I think this is a really important part of his personality and who he was. He was comfortable with risk. He was willing to take these kinds of chances. And I think also given the fact that he's been doing this now for four years, he feels confident. He also imagines that he'll be safe, that he can survive this new challenge. And so when he next meets his handler, he tells him that he's willing to give it a go.

Odds be damned.

So the next question that faces Frank and his handler is, how am I going to get into the IRA? Obviously, there's no form you can fill out or recruiting office you can go to. And if you were to even ask a local member of the IRA how to join, that would immediately plant suspicion on you. You'd look like someone who is a plant, who is someone probably working as a spy. So what he does instead is he begins to hang out at the local Sinn Féin office. By this time...

Sinn Fein is an increasingly above-board political party. And like many such organizations, it depends on the contributions of willing volunteers, so it is by no means unusual for a figure from within the community to poke their head in and offer to help. But doing so at this particular office would put Frank in a very valuable position.

There are three private rooms in the upstairs floor of this particular building. One of those is for Martin McGuinness. So it doubles up very much as a place where Martin McGuinness does Sinn Fein work, but also has discussions about IRA operations. It is this cohabitation

So Frank begins to hang out there, he begins to help out in as much as he can. And he also lets it be known that he's someone who's regularly crossing the nearby border with the Republic of Ireland with a trailer on the back of his car. And the trailer has dogs in it. And...

What he knows, and everyone in the building knows, is that one of the ways that the IRA will raise money is by taking stuff across the border disguised in dog trailers, disguised in horse boxes. The movement of certain materials across the porous border is a crucial part of the operation of the IRA.

Sometimes it would be alcohol, so they could just sell it. Sometimes it would be weapons and explosives. But this was a really tried and tested way of getting across the border, and this is something the IRA were doing a lot. So Frank can help in this regard. This game requires patience. Offer your services a little too enthusiastically, and you will draw the wrong kind of attention. But dangle the solution to a constant problem gently enough...

And it's only a matter of time before someone takes the bait. We don't know exactly how it began or who proposed it to him, but at some point after he begins to hang out in the local Sinn Féin office, someone asks him if he can help to move something across the border. That's where it begins. He's not sworn into the IRA, but he begins to help. And slowly, he becomes more trusted. Gradually, Frank is entrusted with bigger and more sensitive tasks.

The plan is working. But then... Frank is beginning to help out with the local IRA. And news of what has just happened makes its way to Belfast. And it comes to the attention of a man called Ivor Bell, who is, I think a lot of people would agree at that time, a terrifying figure. Ivor Bell grew up Protestant before renouncing his faith and joining the IRA, hence his nickname, the Heathen.

He sits on the IRA Army Council, has recently served as its Chief of Staff,

His reputation is one of ruthless commitment to the cause. And he is suspicious of Frank Hegarty. He's heard rumors about Frank Hegarty. He knows that Frank Hegarty lives with a Protestant partner. That's already a red flag for him. Another problem for him is the rumor that Frank might have been seen talking to a soldier six years previously, so in an earlier phase of the troubles.

And that rumour alone is enough to just put a cloud of suspicion over Frank in the eyes of someone like Ivor Bell. And Ivor Bell's biggest concern is that Frank is being touted as a potential recruit for one of the most important departments of the IRA. The IRA has different departments or sections, and one of them is called the Quartermaster's Department.

And that's the one that is basically involved in supplying weapons and explosives and ammunition to volunteers. Essentially, this is the movement's armory. The idea that someone like Frank Hegarty, with his dubious background and commitment, could have access to such integral and sensitive knowledge is unconscionable for the heathen.

So Ida Bell, when he hears about what's happening over in Derry, he sends a message back saying this cannot happen. Make sure Frank Hegarty has nothing to do with the local IRA. Just as the ploy appears to be taking off, it is shut down. There is no coming back from the heathen's veto. His word is gospel. Frank's handlers are obviously upset. They've got so close to getting their agent into this extremely promising position.

In many ways, this should have been where the story ends, with Frank returning to the rhythms of his life in Derry, safe in the knowledge that he gave all he could. But an unusual thing then happens, and one which sets up the end of this story, and that is that Martin McGuinness comes forward and says that he will personally vouch for Frank Hegarty. There is only one man in the IRA powerful enough to overrule Ivor Bell's stark warning.

Martin McGuinness has known Frank Hegarty for years and he believes in him. He says Frank Hegarty is someone you can trust. I trust him. We can take him on. We can rely on him. He can help to move things back and forth across the border or anywhere else. So if Frank turns out to be a spy, it's on Martin McGuinness. And this allows Frank to then be taken on by the local quartermaster department in Derry.

With that recommendation, the wheels of fate have been irreversibly set into motion. At this moment, Freddy Scappaticci and Frank Hegarty have never met. They live in different cities and lead vastly different lives. Their motivations are likewise worlds apart. And yet...

With their hard-won proximity to two of the leading figures in the IRA, they have become two of the most valuable assets that British intelligence has in their mission to end the Troubles. Assets they will do anything to protect. Right now, they are on separate paths, but there will come a time when those paths converge. One step at a time, they are walking towards a damp night in rural Ireland.

They are moving towards the brutal crack of four gunshots in the dark. In part two of Four Shots in the Night, loyalties are put to the test. So the first job Frank is given is to hide a small number of rifles and some ammunition somewhere in Derry. As two spies climb the ranks. So Freddy Scappaticci soon becomes established within the IRA. He becomes extremely trusted.

And he also becomes a member of something called the Nutting Squad. For the handlers running them, one impossible conundrum hangs over it all. The Spymaster's Dilemma boils down to one simple question. Will I save more lives if I act on this piece of intelligence? Or will I save more lives if I do not? That's next week on True Spies.

Disclaimer. The views expressed in this podcast are those of the subject. These stories are told from their perspective and their authenticity should be assessed on a case-by-case basis. If you're enjoying this podcast, please click now to give it a five-star rating or leave a review. Ratings and reviews help people discover the podcast and help us bring you more great stories. And if you have some time, why not forward the podcast to a friend?

Frank Hegarty, a new recruit of the provisional IRA's quartermaster division, has just been given an assignment. To hide a small number of rifles somewhere in Derry. And they come up with the idea of building what's called a hide, where they can store these weapons in the local cemetery. When Frank next meets with his handlers, he

He tells them the exact location of the cache. This brings us to something that I call in the book the spy master's dilemma. Will I save more lives if I act on this piece of intelligence? Or will I save more lives if I do not? And on this occasion, they decided to keep these weapons in play. Not very long after, someone who's close to the IRA comes up to him and says, we need one of those rifles for a job that's coming up. But Frank duly supplies it, and that appears to be the end of it.

Except, of course, it's not the end of it. Not even close. True Spies from Spyscape Studios. Search for True Spies wherever you get your podcasts.