Unanswered questions as paedophile football coach Jim McCafferty finally jailed ... He left Celtic in 1996 following indecency probe ... Then joined Falkirk FC but 'retired through ill health' after Sunday Mail newspaper discovered his past ... Yet McCafferty remained free to abuse

A YOUTH football coach who left Celtic after a police probe into teen sex abuse allegations has quit newly-promoted Falkirk.

Jim McCafferty, 59, retired after secret police documents revealed that he was once a potential suspect in the 1996 murder of football starlet Lawrence Haggart.

He was cleared and serial paedophile Brian Beattie later convicted.

Kit man McCafferty left Celtic in 1996, weeks after the murder of 14-year-old Lawrence, whom he helped coach.

At the time McCafferty was the subject of a probe into allegations of indecency — although he was not prosecuted or convicted.

The police report, released last month, criticised murder inquiry head Detective Superintendent Jim Winning for not pursuing McCafferty as a possible suspect.

The report told how McCafferty was a regular visitor to the Haggart home in Larbert, Stirlingshire, and had phoned the house on the day of the murder.

McCafferty left Celtic because of the police investigation into indecency allegations before he joined the Parkhead club.

He joined Falkirk manager, former Celtic and Hibs star John 'Yogi' Hughes, at the club in 2004.

McCafferty has undergone a recent Disclosure Scotland check. An enhanced disclosure, the type required for those working with kids, would be likely to contain details of the 1996 abuse investigation.

Last night Falkirk chief executive George Craig said: 'Jim McCafferty intimated to the club that he would be retiring at the end of the season through ill health and we accepted that.

'All people working with children are subject to a Disclosure Scotland check and these are confidential.'

Last week we revealed damning criticism of cops involved in the case by James Mackay, the then assistant chief constable of Tayside Police.

He accused them of planting a hammer at Lawrence's home to try and frame 12-year-old brother Dennis.

Lawrence was battered as he slept on a sofa, then set on fire by Beattie

This exclusive report by Russell Findlay was first published in the Sunday Mail on June 5, 2005

Comments

Lowlander201220 August 2019 at 18:17
Did McCafferty or Torbett know or have connections to Beattie. Has McCafferty been contacted or a visit sought. He must have more to say on young Lawrence and others from potentially 50 years of abusing! His links to Bennell and links also to Torbett at Fairbridge charity.
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Russell Findlay is an investigations journalist reporting on law, politics, health, business and crime. He is also the author of non-fiction books. A fter 25 years with various newspapers he can now be found at STV News

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