On arrival at the Garda station, Don was told by the custody sergeant that he could
notify a solicitor of his arrest, or one could be appointed if he wished. When Don gave
the name of the solicitor he wanted to be contacted the detectives standing at Don’s
side started to growl menacingly that he was a man who was known as the ‘Provo
lawyer’. But he was also the solicitor who acted on behalf of Don’s infirm uncle and
that’s the only way he knew him. Once in the interrogation room, a guard said that his
uncle would have to be questioned about this, as well as Don’s whereabouts on the
morning of his arrest. ‘Go into his house like you came into mine and you’ll kill him,’ Don
warned the garda sergeant who had arrested him. He then went onto request for a
Community Psychiatric Nurse to be contacted and, if necessary, to accompany them.
The guards ignored Don’s warning and as a result there would be serious
consequences for his uncle.

Away from the interrogation room detectives made visits to his cell to make threats to
his daughter’s future if he didn’t cooperate, and throughout the night a vent continued to
circulate cold air within his cell to set his teeth chattering so hard that Don could not
sleep. Then, in the late hours of his second night in custody, Don was told to call his
solicitor as he was about to rearrested for membership of the IRA. Don repeated, during
thirteen sessions of questioning, that there was nothing he could say about either the
ammunition or the Northern Bank robbery because he knew nothing. After three days
Don was informed a file would be sent to the Director of Public Prosecutions before he
was released from custody without charge. His solicitor was there to drive him home
once they shouldered their way through the phalanx of waiting media. But Don didn’t
want to go home – he needed to see how his uncle was doing.