Editing Stevens Inquiries (section)

{{Short description|1989–2003 British inquiries on Northern Ireland}}
{{EngvarB|date=November 2013}}
{{Use dmy dates|date=March 2025}}
The '''Stevens Inquiries''' were three official [[Her Majesty's Government|British government]] [[Inquiry|inquiries]] led by [[John Stevens, Baron Stevens of Kirkwhelpington|Sir John Stevens]] concerning [[collusion]] in Northern Ireland between [[loyalist paramilitaries]] and the [[British Security Service|state security forces]]. While Stevens declared in 1990 that collusion was "neither wide-spread nor institutionalised", by April 2003 he acknowledged that he had uncovered collusion at a level "way beyond" his 1990 view.<ref>[[The Independent]] ''Now it's time for Tony Blair to fulfil the promise he made to me'' 18 April 2003</ref> Much of Stevens' evidence was obtained from advanced [[fingerprint]] techniques to link people to documents. By 2005 the team had identified 2,000 people from their prints with a further 1,015 sets of prints outstanding.<ref>p176 [[Lord Stevens of Kirkwhelpington|John Stevens]] ''Not for the Faint-Hearted''; Weidenfeld & Nicolson; 2005 {{ISBN|978-0-297-84842-4}}</ref>