Loyalist Volunteer Force
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The Loyalist Volunteer Force (LVF) is a unionist paramilitary grouping in Northern Ireland which broke away from the Ulster Volunteer Force (UVF) and was led by the late Billy Wright. It is outlawed as a terrorist organisation in the UK and Ireland.
Billy Wright , believed to be responsible for the deaths of 30 Catholics (mostly civilians with no paramilitary connections), was the leader of the mid-Ulster brigade of the UVF. Internal differences between Wright and the UVF's brigade staff in Belfast came to a head in July 1996 during the Drumcree dispute. The body of a Roman Catholic taxi driver was found dumped a few miles from Lurgan. Although no grouping claimed the murder, it was strongly suspected that it was Wright's UVF. The mid-Ulster unit was stood down - Wright took most of the unit's members with him and set up the LVF. Wright is believed to have exerted a strong moral force among LVF members, for example, banning pornography in the LVF wing of the Long Kesh prison. However, after his death, the LVF became the only paramilitary organisation to have had one of their members raped (by other members) in the prison.
Although believed to be behind many atrocities in the mid-Ulster area—centred on Lurgan/Portadown including many attacks on civilians, Wright was finally charged with menacing behaviour and sentenced to eight years at the Maze prison. There he demanded a separate wing for the LVF prisoners. The authorities agreed and the wing became a gathering point for various dissident shades of unionist paramilitaries, including many from Belfast and north Down.
Wright was murdered on the 27th December 1997 by members of the INLA housed in an adjacent wing of the prison, as he sat in a van waiting to be taken for a visit. An inquiry has been promised by the British government into how the men had knowledge of Wright's movements and access to the unionist wing. That night, LVF gunmen killed a bouncer in Tyrone who prevented a massacre by physically blocking their entrance to a pub.
Wright's successor as LVF leader, Mark Fulton, was found hanged in Maghaberry prison in 2002. He is believed to have committed suicide.
The LVF is the only paramilitary group in Ireland to have killed a journalist, Dara O'Hagan, who was exposing their involvement in the heroin trade. The LVF is the most deeply involved in the supply of heroin than any other paramilitary group. Despite their supposed war on Irish republicanism, they have only ever killed civilians with no paramilitary backgrounds.