Two Men Charged in Killing of Journalist in Northern Ireland

Two Men Charged in Killing of Journalist in Northern Ireland

Two men have been charged with murder in the death of the journalist Lyra McKee, who was shot and killed in 2019 while observing riots in the city of Derry in Northern Ireland.The killing of the journalist, who was 29, was treated as a terrorist episode, and the authorities attributed it to militants opposed to British rule.The two men, identified as Peter Géaroid Cavanagh, 33, and Jordan Devine, 21, appeared in court via a video link on Friday, according to the Northern Ireland Courts and Tribunal Service.The men were also charged with possession of a firearm and ammunition with intent to endanger life, rioting, possession of gasoline bombs, throwing gasoline bombs and arson. Mr. Cavanagh was also charged with robbery.The two defendants were with the gunman on the night he fired the shot that killed Ms. McKee, according to a lawyer with the Public Prosecution Service for Northern Ireland, the BBC reported. Defense lawyers called the case weak, according to local news reports.A third man, Joe Campbell, 20, also appeared and has been charged with rioting, possession of gasoline bombs and throwing gasoline bombs, the courts service said.A 19-year-old who was taken into custody with the three others this week was released pending a review by the Public Prosecution Service, the police said.Paul McIntyre, 53, was charged with Ms. McKee’s murder in March 2020; he denies the charge.Ms. McKee was killed after some of the worst rioting to rock Northern Ireland in years.Most of the violence took place in Creggan, a heavily Roman Catholic area of Derry, which is referred to as Londonderry by unionists who want the region to remain part of the United Kingdom.Ms. McKee spoke of her generation as the Ceasefire Babies, too young to remember the worst of the sectarian violence.“I was 4,” she wrote in an article before her death. “We were the Good Friday Agreement generation, destined not to witness the horrors of war but to reap the spoils of peace. The spoils never seemed to reach us.”