Gilbert "Danny" McNamee (born 29 September 1960[1]) is a former electronic engineer from Crossmaglen, Northern Ireland, who was wrongly convicted in 1987 of conspiracy to cause explosions, including the Provisional Irish Republican Army's (IRA) Hyde Park bombing on 20 July 1982.
[2][3] McNamee was arrested on 16 August 1986 at his home in Crossmaglen by the British Army and Royal Ulster Constabulary, then flown to London and charged with conspiracy to cause explosions.
[4] However, his fingerprint was found on electronic circuits in an arms cache that was linked to the Hyde Park bombing.
[5] After five hours of deliberation by the jury, McNamee was found guilty on all charges and sentenced to 25 years in prison.
McNamee was later to be the first case referred to the Court of Appeal by the Criminal Cases Review Commission, and his conviction was overturned on 17 December 1998, because of other, much more prominent, fingerprints on the same circuits, belonging to known IRA bomb-maker Dessie Ellis (who received a ten-year sentence in Ireland for possession of explosives after the bombings, but before MacNamee's trial), which were not disclosed at McNamee's original trial.