The relatives of those killed in the Omagh bombing vowed to continue their fight for justice today, after Sean Hoey, the only man ever to be charged with the murder of their loved ones almost a decade ago, was acquitted.

The families insisted that their £14 million compensation claim against the men they claim were responsible for the attack will go ahead as planned. The civil action is scheduled to begin in Belfast next April.

They also called for a full cross-border public inquiry, involving police forces from the UK and Ireland, and the resignation of the Northern Ireland chief constable at the time of the attack, Sir Ronnie Flanagan.

Meanwhile, Mr Hoey threatened legal action against a father who lost his 12 year-old son in the attack. Kevin Winters, Mr Hoey's lawyer, said Victor Barker's comments made after the verdict yesterday were actionable.

"Sean Hoey refutes completely the allegations made by Victor Barker when he persists in blaming him for Omagh," he said.

He also said they were considering action against the Public Prosecution Service for taking the case against Mr Hoey.

After a 56-day, £16 million trial and four years on remand, Mr Hoey, a 38 year-old electrician from South Armagh, was found not guilty of 58 charges relating to the Omagh bombing in August 1998.

Among the charges he faced were 29 counts of murder, for the 29 people, including an 18 month-old baby, a mother pregnant with twins and members of three generations of one family, who died when a car bomb detonated in Omagh's busy town centre.

Giving the verdict, Mr Justice Weir accused police officers working on the case of "deliberate and calculated deception" and said that their treatment of the evidence had been "slapdash" and "thoughtless".

He said the prosecution had not come close to proving Mr Hoey's guilt beyond reasonable doubt.

After the verdict, Mr Barker said Sir Ronnie could not be allowed to continue as head of Her Majesty’s Inspectorate of Constabulary, a post he received after overseeing the conversion of the Royal Ulster Constabulary into the Police Service of Northern Ireland as part of the peace process.

Speaking on BBC Radio Ulster today, the Northern Ireland Secretary, Shaun Woodward, noticeably failed to support Sir Ronnie.

Asked repeatedly if Sir Ronnie still had the support of the Government, Mr Woodward replied: “The lessons to be learnt from this judgment are far and wide. It is important that we look at this very, very carefully.

“It wouldn’t do any kind of justice to the 29 people who were murdered in the bomb and the two unborn children for me to give you a phlegmatic response.”

Michael Gallagher, whose 21 year-old son Aiden was among those killed, described his "total devastation" at the verdict on BBC television this morning.

“For the families involved, for the police, for the [Criminal Prosecution Service], for law and order, yesterday was a bad day and we have to sit down and look at how we move on from here," he said.

He urged British, Northern Irish and Irish authorities to consider a cross-border investigation: “The people who planted the Omagh bomb travelled from the Republic of Ireland and spent less than 40 minutes in Northern Ireland.

“I think there are serious lessons not just for Northern Ireland, but for Britain and Ireland to learn from this atrocity.

“Let us have that inquiry so we can at least move on to some degree with our lives.”

Of the families' civil case, he said: "We have no choice. Our backs are against the wall."

The families began the legal action in 2001 with a civil writ naming 22 family members as plaintiffs. The defendants were named as Seamus McKenna, Michael McKevitt, Liam Campbell, Colm Murphy, Seamus Daly and, in an unprecedented move, the dissident Irish republican group who claimed responsibility for the bombing, the Real IRA.

Mr Murphy, Mr Hoey's uncle, became the first and only person to be convicted in connection with the attack in 2002. He was found guilty of conspiracy to cause the Omagh bombing and sentenced to 14 years in prison, but his conviction was later overturned on appeal.

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