One Nation senator warned against CPR for dying Belfast man

A new One Nation senator who used to serve in the British Army warned a fellow soldier against performing CPR on a man suffering a heart attack in a Belfast home they were searching during the 1970s, according to a recent memoir.

The circumstances of the man’s death caused outrage during the Northern Ireland conflict, with his son — who became one of the Irish Republican Army (IRA)’s most feared assassins — calling it a formative memory.

The tale is just one of many from the life of Warwick Stacey, the new One Nation senator who was officially elected in the final spot in the NSW Senate and arrived in parliament last week. Neither Stacey nor One Nation responded to repeated requests for comment.

In interviews given in the lead-up to the federal election, Stacey has shared views including that the Stolen Generations are a “myth”, that net zero is “impossible” because carbon is a building block of life, and that he opposed any immigration or refugees from “extremist countries” like “Gaza”, Afghanistan and Pakistan.

Stacey also spoke about his time serving in the British Army and as a self-described “military contractor” in the Middle East and India. His stint in the British Army included serving in the 2nd Battalion, Parachute Regiment in Belfast, Northern Ireland, in the 1970s.

This was during a violent period known as the Troubles, during which the British Army was deployed in a “peace-keeping” role as conflict broke out between Irish Catholic nationalists who wanted Northern Ireland to become part of the Republic of Ireland and Protestant unionists (loyalists) who wanted to remain a part of the United Kingdom.

Part of Stacey’s service was captured in a 2020 memoir by fellow serviceman David Ellis called A Winter In Belfast. The book is a transcript of Ellis’ diary entries from the time, supplemented with comments from other members of the company, including Stacey.

A Winter in Belfast includes two diary entries surrounding the events of January 25, 1977. Ellis wrote that his unit searched three houses as a “follow-up action” to a nearby bombing. During the search, Ellis wrote, the house’s owner, Frank Moyna, had a heart attack and “keeled over and expired”. Ellis said that a doctor and priest were called straightaway and that the soldiers left once the priest arrived.

Ellis included a comment from Stacey about his role in the events. The future senator said he told a fellow soldier, Michael “Embo” Emberson, not to do CPR on Moyna due to concerns about hurting the man and how it might look to people after the fact.

“I remember telling Embo not to pump his chest, as I had been told that to do a good job on that you had to hear ribs crack. I didn’t think that would be a good look at any subsequent inquest,” Stacey said, according to Ellis.

Crikey does not suggest that Stacey’s actions contributed to Moyna’s death.

Ellis said the soldiers were accused by Irish republicans of “murder by refusing access to medical teams”. Next day’s diary entry said subsequent media coverage on TV, radio and in the papers alleged “medical assistance was refused, that the ambulance was delayed, that the man was assaulted, that his wife was assaulted and so on”.

The book says there were threats of violence made against the troops and that residents used their cars to block off a small town, Clonard, in protest over Moyna’s death. A socialist paper, Big Flamereported that residents and troops broke out into “hand-to-hand fighting”.

The next week, local MP Gerry Fitt asked Secretary of State for Defence Lord Fred Mulley in parliament about the incident and whether there would be an investigation.

“The search was properly conducted as part of their security duties by the soldiers concerned and with due consideration for the distress of Mr. and Mrs. Moyna. I much regret the death of Mr. Moyna from a heart attack while the search was in progress,” Mulley replied. He said there would be an inquest. (Documents from the inquest are not publicly available. However, Crikey is going through the freedom of information process via the Public Record Office of Northern Ireland to obtain access.)

Moyna has been remembered by republicans as a martyr and they blame the soldiers for his death. The Troubles researcher Malcolm Sutton has included Moyna as one of the dozens of “sudden deaths due to a heart problem during an incident”. In Clonard, Moyna is listed on a plaque dedicated to “civilians murdered by loyalist and British forces during the course of the conflict”.

Crikey does not suggest Moyna was intentionally killed or that the soldiers were in any way responsible for his death, only that Irish republicans have characterised it this way.

Moyna’s son, Gerard “Hucker” Moyna, would go on to become one of the IRA’s most feared killers. After he died last year, Irish newspaper Sunday World said the younger Moyna was convicted of terrorism charges and that its security sources claim he may have been responsible for up to 23 deaths during the Troubles.

The paper said Gerard’s friends believed Frank Moyna’s death was a formative moment for the man who would become “one of the IRA’s most trusted killers”.

“Hucker was traumatised by the death of his dad. It was the aggressive behaviour of the soldiers which gave him a heart attack,” a friend told Sunday World.

Ellis confirmed to Crikey via WhatsApp that this was the same Warwick Stacey who is now a One Nation senator, and that he is set to meet him next week in the UK. He said it wasn’t strange for Australians to serve in the British Army during the ’70s.

“It’s about the man, not the passport,” he said, before saying he’d need to speak to Stacey before saying any more.

After leaving the army and serving as a consultant, Stacey served as a specialist crisis and risk management consultant. Prior to running for One Nation, Stacey also stood for the Seniors United Party in a 2017 election.