Beast of friends | 

Knife-killer who stabbed fiancée 50 times buddied up with child rapist and murderer behind bars

The ex-UDA men met up and became good friends when they spent time behind bars together in HMP Maghaberry

Hugh Jordan

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Loyalist knife-killer Andy Robinson was best buddies with child-murderer and rapist John Clifford, the Sunday World has learned.

The ex-UDA men met up and became good friends when they spent time behind bars together in HMP Maghaberry, having both been convicted of heinous offences.

Robinson was recruited into the UDA’s notorious ‘Hallion Battalion’ — based on Belfast’s Shankill Road — by UDA boss Gary ‘Smickers’ Smith, while sex pervert and child killer Clifford had joined the loyalist terror group in Coleraine.

A former prisoner who served time for firearms offences alongside the UDA pair said this week that they loved boasting and swapping stories about which of them had committed the most evil acts.

“Robinson and Clifford were the most hated men in the jail. They were detested by other prisoners. And Robinson was suspected of keeping himself right with the screws,” he said.

“On one occasion he complained that a top loyalist was stealing his medication and he got the man moved over it, although there wasn’t a word of truth in it,” said the former loyalist prisoner.

But their close jailhouse friendship in Braid House came a cropper when a man, mopping the floor in the cell block, threw a bucket of boiling water over Robinson’s back.

​Known as ‘The King of the Sex Perverts’, a screaming Robinson was rushed to the prison hospital before being transferred to Bann House, a special wing for ‘at risk’ prisoners.

A former loyalist prisoner who witnessed the attack told us this week: “Andy Robinson was badly scalded in an attack which was ordered by a loyalist lifer from mid-Ulster. Boiling water ripped the skin off him, leaving blisters all over his back.

“Prison officers came running to Robinson’s assistance, but there wasn’t a single prisoner who lifted a finger to help him. They were all disgusted at what he had done to that young woman,” he said.

“At that time, Robinson and Clifford were the most despised prisoners in Maghaberry, but they were really well suited to each other and spent a lot of time together.”

Last week the Sunday World revealed how evil Robinson (45) — who spent 20 years behind bars for stabbing his fiancée nearly 50 times — was back on the streets.

Julie-Anne Osborne (22) — the mum of Robinson’s baby daughter — was savagely attacked by the UDA man while she slept in her bed two days before Christmas, while recovering from a previous beating he had given her just days before.

At his trial in 2002, a jury heard how Robinson had stabbed Julie-Anne so severely he severed her spinal cord.

Judge Michael Nicholson sent Robinson to jail for life, recommending he spend a minimum of 20 years behind bars.

Robinson’s release from prison was confirmed last week after he was spotted waiting for a bus on Belfast’s Woodstock Road. The killer was filmed by Jennifer Osborne, a cousin of his young victim. She asked him: “Do you remember me Robinson?” And she added: “We meet again.”

Later Jennifer revealed how she last saw Robinson on the day he was sent to jail for life for murdering her cousin.

“I spat on him as he stood in the dock and I knew I’d never forget his evil face,” she said.

Robinson’s jailhouse buddy Clifford is still behind bars.

In 1989, Clifford was jailed for life for abducting and raping his eight-year-old niece Sue-Ellen. He later murdered the youngster before dumping her body on a railway track.

Clifford later appeared in court again charged with sexually abusing a boy two years before he murdered his niece.

The trial judge told Clifford the boy — who was then an adult — had been diagnosed with post-traumatic stress disorder.

Along with Robinson, Clifford liked to boast to other prisoners that they were both senior members of the UDA and other loyalist prisoners suspected them of taking heroin. Five years ago, Clifford was allowed out of prison to attend an appointment, but was posted missing when he was due to return. He was arrested by police a few days later.