Schoolboy ‘likely’ shot by soldier in hospital grounds in 1975, coroner finds

An unidentified British Army soldier was responsible “more likely than not” for the fatal shooting of a schoolboy in the grounds of a Belfast hospital almost 50 years ago, a coroner has found.

Patrick Crawford, 15, was shot dead while walking through the grounds of the Royal Victoria Hospital at around 9.40pm on August 10 1975.

In 2015, Northern Ireland’s former attorney general John Larkin granted a fresh inquest into Patrick’s death after representations from his family over the Troubles killing.

Delivering his findings at Belfast’s Laganside Courthouse on Monday, Judge Philip Gilpin said the teenager died of a single gunshot wound to the chest.

He told the court: “The cumulative effect of the facts as found by me, and the various strands of evidence when brought together, satisfy me on the balance of probabilities, to a sufficient degree of cogency, that it is more likely than not that Patrick was shot by an unidentified British Army soldier in circumstances…