A PLAQUE has been unveiled in Derry to remember a 15-year-old killed by the British army as Operation Motorman got underway in 1972.
Daniel Hegarty was shot dead by a soldier in the city’s Creggan area on the morning of July 31 that year.
The teenager was shot in the head at point-blank range with a machine gun just hours into Operation Motorman, which was the British army’s attempt to retake areas in Belfast and Derry believed to be “no-go” zones for security forces and under republican control.
Later that morning the IRA detonated three car bombs in Claudy, killing nine people.
The bombing was thought to be a response to the security operation.
Daniel was one of two young people killed in Derry that morning, with 19-year-old IRA member Seamus Bradley also shot dead in suspicious circumstances.
A cousin of Daniel was also shot alongside him, but survived. It was initially claimed by the army that Daniel had been carrying a nail bomb before the allegation was later withdrawn.
A 2011 inquest found that Daniel did not pose a threat to soldiers.
Yesterday a plaque was unveiled at the site in Creggan Heights where Daniel was shot.
His sister Margaret said: “We are all living in a nightmare of a never ending stream of injustice.
“Shooting a defenceless and small harmless child in the head at point blank range was acceptable to the British army in 1972 and it is even more acceptable to them now,”
Daniel Hegarty with his sister Kathleen who has carried on the fight for justice for her brother
“The British state is legitimising the murder of innocent civilians and children by their own army.”
She added that her family would continue to seek “justice and accountability” for Daniel’s death.
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