Michael Stone (loyalist) - Return To UDA

Return To UDA

In 1984 Stone decided to reactive his membership of the UDA and contacted Andy Tyrie to receive permission. After a brief period with the near moribund Mid-Ulster Brigade, Stone, who felt he was too well known in east Belfast to rejoin the local brigade, met John McMichael and was soon seconded to his South Belfast Brigade. McMichael soon provided Stone with guns and placed him in a team whose purpose was to fill McMichael's hit list, a list of high-profile republican targets the Brigadier wanted killed. His first target was Owen Carron and Stone trailed him for several weeks but on the day he was due to kill the Sinn Fein activist he was tipped off that police knew about the plan and were approaching so the hit was abandoned.

On 16 November 1984 Stone completed his first murder when he shot and killed Catholic milkman Patrick Brady, a man Stone claimed was a member of the PIRA. However according to the Conflict Archive on the Internet Brady was a member of Sinn Fein but was not active in the IRA. This was followed in 1985 by an attempt to kill another Sinn Fein activist Robert McAllister but on this occasion Stone was unsuccessful. He subsequently killed Kevin McPolin in November 1985 and would also face charges for the murder of Dermot Hackett in 1987. Stone would subsequently admit to killing McPolin but has claimed that he did not kill Hackett but confessed to his murder in order that a young UFF member might escape punishment.