Eddie Copeland

Eddie Copeland is a prominent Irish republican from Belfast,cite web | title= Prominent Republican refused bail| date= 2001-08-31| work=RTÉ News | url= http://www.rte.ie/news/2001/0831/republican.html| accessdate=2007-07-19] Northern Ireland, whose home was searched as part of the PSNI investigation into the 2004 Northern Bank robbery. [cite web | title=Adams' anger at bank probe raids | date=2004-12-26 | work=BBC News | url=http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/northern_ireland/4124947.stm | accessdate=2007-07-19] During the search in December 2004, detectives checked every room in Copeland's three-storey home in Holmdene Gardens, Ardoyne, and took away shoes and mobile phones. At one stage during the two hour search they opened thirty Christmas presents. Copeland denied having anything to with the robbery and felt the search was a "politically-motivated operation". [cite web | author=Simon Freeman | title=Police launch dawn raids in hunt for stolen £22 million | date=2004-12-24 | work=Times Online | url=http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/uk/article405697.ece | accessdate=2007-07-19]

Copeland joined the Provisional Irish Republican Army after the fatal shooting of his father by the British Army. John Copeland died on 31 October, 1971, two days after being shot near his home in Strathroy Park in Ardoyne. John Copeland was not known to be affiliated with any paramilitary group. [ [http://cain.ulst.ac.uk/sutton/alpha/C.html CAIN] ]

Copeland himself has been the target of Loyalist paramilitaries. In December 1996 he was seriously injured in a Ulster Defence Association car bomb attack at his home.cite web | title= North Belfast woman on UDA hit list| date= 2002-09-25| work= An Phoblacht/Republican News| url= http://republican-news.org/archive/2002/September19/18nord.html| accessdate=2007-07-19] He suffered leg and arm injuries but escaped with his life when Loyalists paramilitaries planted a booby-trap beneath his car. [cite web | title=A series of articles from the Irish News marking the fourth anniversary of the murder of Rosemary Nelson | month=March | year=2003 | work=Irish News | url= http://www.serve.com/pfc/rosemary/in030313_14.html| accessdate=2007-07-19] Copeland later received £60,000 in compensation for the injuries he received. [cite web | title= Senior Republican figure charged with kidnap| date= 2001-08-24| work= RTÉ News| url= http://www.rte.ie/news/2001/0824/republican.html| accessdate=2007-07-19]

On 8 February 1995, Andrew Clarke (27), a private in the British Army, was sentenced at Belfast Crown Court to ten years' imprisonment for the attempted murder of Eddie Copeland in Belfast in October 1993. [cite web | title=Draft Chronology of the Conflict -1995 | date=1995-02-08 | work= CAIN| url=http://cain.ulst.ac.uk/othelem/chron/ch95.htm | accessdate=2007-07-19] On 19 May 1999, the Ministry of Defence was found guilty of negligence at Belfast High Court, as Eddie Copeland was awarded £27,500 compensation for injuries he received when a British soldier opened fire on mourners outside the home of deceased IRA Volunteer Thomas Begley in October 1993. [cite web | author=Padraig MacDabhaid | title=British held liable for soldier attack | date=1999-05-27 | work= An Phoblacht/Republican News| url=http://republican-news.org/archive/1999/May27/27eddi.html | accessdate=2007-07-19]

In 2001 Copeland was refused bail at Belfast High Court on charges of kidnapping, false imprisonment, assault and threatening to kill another person. The charges arose from the abduction of a man from a betting shop in Ardoyne. Copeland denied all charges.

In 2002 Copeland criticised the RUC/PSNI for not informing his pregnant partner until 11 September 2002, that she was on a Loyalist hit list, despite the information appearing in newspapers on 8 September 2002.

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