Reel Justice and Real Courtrooms - In The Name of the Father
Thyria Wilson

The 1991 movie In the Name of the Father is based on the autobiography by Gerry Conlon titled "Proved Innocent," telling the story of the wrongful conviction and imprisonment of the "Guildford Four" and the "Maguire Seven." It is a powerful film dealing with a horrible miscarriage ofjustice. The movie was directed by Jim Sheridan and starred Daniel Day-Lewis, Pete Postlethwaite, and Emma Thompson. Before he co-wrote the screenplay with Jim Sheridan, Terry George was convicted of possession of a loaded gun with intent to endanger life and spent three years in R!"ison in Ireland.

In 1974 Gerry Conlon, a petty thief in Belfast Ireland, was sent to London to live with his aunt Annie Maguire. Shortly afterwards the IRA bombs two pubs in Guildford, England. Five people are killed and many are seriously wounded. During the ensuing witch-hunt atmosphere the English police hold Gerry and his friend Paul Hill without charges under the Prevention of Terrorism Act. Confessions are coerced through torture from Gerry, Hill, and two other friends. Seven more defendants (the "Maguire Seven") who include Gerry's father Guiseppe, his aunt Annie and thirteen-year-old cousin Patrick Maguire, are charged with terrorist activities and sentenced to prison. During the sentencing of the "Guildford Four" to life imprisonment, the judge declares that it is unfortunate that Britain no longer has the death penalty.

 In the movie, a civil rights lawyer, Gareth Peirce, takes on the Conlons' cause. She finds a document marked "not to be shown to the defense" which proves that the Guildford Four are innocent. During the re-hearing Peirce makes a dramatic outburst in the court. All charges are dismissed against all of the defendants, but Guiseppe has died in prison.

The movie adds a lot of fictional events to the basic facts. The Guilford Four were convicted in 1975 of two Guildford pub bombings based only on their coerced confessions, the Maguire Seven served time in prison, and Guiseppe died in prison. The police did not disclose exculpatory evidence and coerced confessions. The defendants' convictions were reversed in 1989. However, to add a dramatic father­son relationship, Sheridan put Guiseppe and Gerry in the same cell. Gareth Peirce did not argue the case in court, although she was involved in the case at the end. Alastair Logan, who did not appear in the movie, was a family lawyer who tenaciously fought for his clients for fifteen long years. The British government referred the case to the Court of Appeals in 1989 based on police discovery of irregularities in the original police interrogations. No secret documents were discovered, it was the British government that re-opened the case.