A PAIR of Liverpool fathers have been jailed for their role in the supply of guns to loyalist terrorists.
Roy Barwise and John Irwin used the cover of the city's Orange Lodges to support the ultra-loyalist Ulster Volunteer Force (UVF) in plots in Britain and Northern Ireland.
Today both have been sent to prison after they admitted being members of the banned organisation.
Father of-two Barwise, from Anfield, was jailed for four years and two months and father-of-one Irwin, from Norris Green, was locked up for two and a half years.
But footage unearthed during the investigation revealed there could be many more members of the secretive terror group who have not been convicted and are still walking the streets of Merseyside.
Barwise, 47, and Irwin, 43, were both soldiers who gave up their positions in the Territorial Army tohelp with a campaign of terror against Catholics.
The family men became involved in one of Merseyside's 50 Orange Lodges - innocent social clubs for Protestants in the region which had flourished because of the strong connection between Liverpool and Ireland. But the pair were also committed members of the violent UVF, and used their lodge activities as a front for their secret activities.
David Steer QC, prosecuting, said: "The evidence suggests that the activities of the highly illegal UVF have been concealed by the lawful activity of Protestant Unionism which operates under the banner of the Loyal Orange Lodges in Liverpool.
"Orange parades still take place during the summer marching season in Liverpool and the Battle of the Boyne is commemorated on the 12th July with the Orange Lodges marching throughout the city with drums beating.
"We suggest this activity of marching bands has been used as a cloak by the UVF in Liverpool."
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