biography of Michael stone
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Answer:
Michael Stone (born 2 April 1955) is an ex-member of the Loyalist UDA paramilitary group in Northern Ireland, convicted of three counts of murder committed at an IRA funeral in 1988. In 2000 he was released from prison on licence under the Belfast Agreement. In November 2006, Stone was charged with attempted murder of Martin McGuinness and Gerry Adams, having been arrested attempting to enter the parliament buildings at Stormont while armed.[1] He was subsequently convicted and sentenced to a further 16 years' imprisonment.[2]
Early life
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Stone was born in Harborne, Birmingham, to English parents Cyril Alfred Stone and his wife Mary Bridget (née O'Sullivan).[3] Mary Bridget walked out on the marriage soon after Stone's birth and Cyril Alfred enlisted in the Merchant Navy, leaving the infant Michael in the care of John Gregg and his wife Margaret (Cyril's sister) who lived in Ballyhalbert.[4] Stone has claimed that he suspects his biological mother may have been a Catholic because of her name but added that he was baptised in the Church of Ireland by the Greggs and as such he has always self-identified as Protestant.[5] Cyril Stone subsequently remarried and had two children, Michael Stone's half-siblings, by his second wife – Tracey and Terence – the latter of whom converted to Buddhism and became a monk in Southeast Asia.[6] The Greggs had five biological children with whom Stone was raised and whom he identifies as siblings, a son John and four daughters, Rosemary, Colleen, Sharon and Shirley.[7]
The Greggs moved to the Braniel estate on the outskirts of Belfast in 1959 due to John Gregg securing employment with Harland and Wolff shipyard.[8] Stone attended Braniel Primary School and Lisnasharragh Secondary School, where fellow pupils included George Best, who was in the same class as Stone's sister Rosemary Gregg.[9] Stone enrolled in the Army Cadet Force as a fourteen-year-old where he received basic training in firearm use.[10] Stone was expelled from school at fifteen and a half after a series of playground fights and left Lisnasharragh with no formal qualifications.[11] He would find work as a "hammer boy" in the shipyard only a few weeks later.[12] However he got into a fight with another worker and, following a suspension, resigned his position.[13]
Move to loyalism
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The UFF East Belfast Brigade of which Stone became a member
In 1970 Stone helped establish a Braniel street gang, which called itself the Hole in the Wall Gang, and which Stone claims included Catholic and Protestant members.[14] Gang members, who adopted a form of uniform consisting of blue jeans and oxblood Dr. Martens and who carried knives, clashed regularly with members of other Braniel gangs as well as those from neighbouring estates in east Belfast.[15] In 1971 Stone joined a "Tartan Gang" that had started up on the Braniel estate and he was soon recognised as "general" of this loyalist group. The gangs were responsible for sectarian violence, which usually took the form of spending Saturday afternoons in Belfast city centre attacking Catholic youths, and vandalising the Catholic repository in Chapel Lane.[16]
Answer:
Michael Stone (born in 2 April 1955) is an Ulster loyalist who was volunteer in the Ulster Defence Association (UDA). Stone was born in England but raised in the Braneil estate in East Belfast, Northern Ireland. He was subsequently convicted and sentenced to a further 16th years' imprisonment.