Seán Mackin is an Irish republican from Belfast, Northern Ireland and a fundraiser for the Friends of Sinn Fein (FOSF).
Mackin is thought to have been a member of the Irish National Liberation Army (INLA) for many years before he and his family moved to the U.S. . He, his wife, Philomena and their Irish-born daughter, Jennifer, were placed in deportation proceedings by the United States government for this reason after years of living illegally in the U.S. where Seán Mackin worked as a plumber in The Bronx.
The family applied for political asylum, alleging harassment and threats from the security forces and Immigration Judge Annette Elstein granted Philomena and Jennifer Mackin political asylum in 1991. Seán Mackin was not granted asylum (as is sometimes misreported) but was granted "suspension of deportation", a different (and, ironically, faster) route to permanent residency and U.S. citizenship. The Mackins also have a second, younger child, Seán Óg, who is a United States citizen by birth. The entire family have since become United States citizens.
In April 2004 on a trip back to Belfast, Mackin was arrested and briefly detained. At the time, a spokesperson for the Police Service of Northern Ireland (PSNI) reported at the time that "a 45-year-old man was arrested by uniformed officers on suspicion of murder at Grosvenor Road, west Belfast, at 2.30 ... [h]e was taken to the Antrim Serious Crimes Suite for questioning." Mackin was held under the Terrorism Act 2000. The murder in question was believed to be that of Reserve Constable Colin Carson, killed in Cookstown, County Tyrone on May 26 1983. However, his United States citizenship and the post-GFA (Good Friday Agreement) political environment made any Northern Irish prosecution, barring perhaps actual eyewitness testimony or some other "smoking gun", untenable.
