Guildford Four and Maguire Seven

The Guildford Four and the Maguire Seven were the collective names of two groups whose convictions in English courts in 1975 and 1976 for the Guildford pub bombings of 5 October 1974 were eventually quashed after long campaigns for justice. The Guildford Four were convicted of bombings carried out by the Provisional Irish Republican Army (IRA), and the Maguire Seven were convicted of handling explosives found during the investigation into the bombings. Both groups' convictions were eventually declared "unsafe and unsatisfactory" and reversed in 1989 and 1991 respectively after they had served up to 15–16 years in prison.

No one else was charged with the bombings, or supplying the material; three police officers were charged with conspiracy to pervert the course of justice, and found not guilty.

The Guildford Four were charged with direct involvement with the IRA attacks. They were:

After their arrest, all four defendants confessed to the bombing under intense coercion by the police. These statements were later retracted, but nonetheless formed the basis of the case against them. They would later be alleged to be the result of coercion by the police, ranging from intimidation to torture—including threats against family members—as well as the effects of drug withdrawal. Conlon argues in his autobiography that a key factor in his purportedly coerced confession was the fact that strengthened anti-terrorism laws passed in the early 1970s allowed the police to hold suspects without charges for up to a week, rather than the previous limit of 48 hours, and that he might have been able to withstand the treatment he had received had the original time limit been in effect.

They were convicted in October 1975 for murder and other charges, and sentenced to life imprisonment - mandatory for adults convicted of murder. Richardson, a minor at the time of the bombings, received an indeterminate "at Her Majesty's pleasure" sentence for murder, but a life sentence for conspiracy. Mr Justice Donaldson, who also presided over the Maguire Seven trial, expressed regret that the Four had not been charged with treason, which then still had a mandatory death penalty; although no executions had been carried out in the UK since 1964, treason still carried the death penalty until 1998. At the time, the normal practice was for judges to be consulted by the Home Secretary when considering release from a life sentence, rather than giving a tariff at trial, but the judge, believing he might be dead by the time they were released, recommended 30 years for Conlon, 35 for Armstrong and until "great age" for Hill.

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