February 16, 2011
By Staff Reporter
By Anne Cadwallader
BELFAST — A New York-based human rights lawyer will be joining the Bloody Sunday Tribunal team and will represent one of the families of the 14 victims when the inquiry reopens in Derry on Nov. 13.
British-born Richard Harvey will represent the family of James Wray. A member of the English bar since 1971, Harvey has practiced as an attorney in New York since 1982, specializing in human rights issues from Northern Ireland to Southern Africa. In the U.S., Harvey has been the main spokesman for the Rosemary Nelson Campaign.
"Bloody Sunday happened just two months after I was called to the bar," Harvey said. "Ever since then, the families of James Wray, and all those in Derry who were murdered and traumatized that day, have waited, demanding that the truth be told and wondering would they ever know justice."
His New York firm has represented the South African government since majority rule was established in 1994 under Nelson Mandela and, as special counsel to former President Jean-Bertrand Aristide, Harvey was instrumental in 1995 in the first successful murder prosecution of a human rights violator in Haiti.
Harvey lives with his wife, lawyer Marlene Archer, and their 10-year-old son, John, in Harlem, where he is partner in the firm of Stevens, Hinds & White. He is also a member of the Tooks Court, London chambers of Michael Mansfield, Q.C.
Sign up to The Irish Echo Newsletter