Robert Storey (11 April 1956 – 21 June 2020) was a Provisional Irish Republican Army (IRA) member from Belfast, Northern Ireland. Prior to an 18-year conviction for possessing a rifle, he also spent time on remand for a variety of charges and in total served 20 years in prison. He also played a key role in the Maze Prison escape, the biggest prison break in British penal history. Early life The family was originally from the Marrowbone area, on the Oldpark Road in North Belfast. The family had to move when Storey was very young due to Ulster loyalist attacks on the district, moving to Manor Street, an interface area also in North Belfast. Storey's uncle was boxing trainer Gerry Storey and his father, also called Bobby, was involved in the defence of the area in the 1970s when Catholics were threatened by loyalists. Storey was one of four children. He had two brothers, Seamus and Brian, and a sister Geraldine. Seamus and Bobby senior had been arrested after a raid on their home which uncovered a rifle and a pistol. Bobby senior was later released but Seamus was charged. Seamus escaped from Crumlin Road Prison with eight other prisoners in 1971, they were dubbed the Crumlin Kangaroos. On his mother Peggy's side of the family there was also a history of republicanism, but Storey said "the dominant influences on" him "were the events that were happening around" him. These included the McGurk's Bar bombing in the New Lodge, some of those killed being people who knew his family, and also Bloody Sunday. This then led to his attempts to join the IRA. Storey left school when he was fifteen and went to work with his father selling fruit. At sixteen, he became a member of the IRA. Prison On 11 April 1973, his seventeenth birthday, he was interned and held at Long Kesh internment camp. He had been arrested 20 times previous to this but was too young for internment. In October 1974 he took part in the protest at Long Kesh against living conditions where internees set fire to the "cages" in which they were being held. He was released from internment in May 1975. He was arrested on suspicion of a bombing at the Skyways Hotel in January 1976 and a kidnapping and murder in the Andersonstown district of Belfast in March 1976, but was acquitted by