BBCA man who was shot in both knees in a paramilitary-style shooting has said the experience has left him leading a life “of mental and physical trauma”.
Liam Barker has spoken out for the first time, saying “it’s time people actually know what kneecapping was and what happened to people who were kneecapped”.
The 53-year-old said the experience of being shot in an attack colloquially known as “kneecapping” as a teenager has led to him living in isolation and fear.
He approached the BBC to tell his story because he said he wanted people to stop thinking that kneecapping was just “a couple of bullet holes and away you go”.
It is rare for victims of such attacks to speak out.
The term “kneecapping” is used in Northern Ireland when self-appointed vigilantes , often paramilitaries , take the law into their own hands and shoot those they accuse of anti-social behaviour in the knees.
The term has been adopted by the Belfast rap trio Kneecap.
Mr Barker said the group’s decision to choose that name was distressing to him and he wanted to convey the severity of what he went through.
Kneecap’s management said there were two reasons that the band used the name Kneecap.
They said that the name was ironic as the band are talking about things that might have got them kneecapped during the Troubles.
They also said that the word kneecap sounds like the Irish for I don’t understand (ni capam). This is to reflect how some members of their audience might not understand their bilingual performances.
This story contains details some readers might find upsetting.
Attacked by a masked gang
Mr Barker grew up in Turf Lodge in west Belfast, where said he was a victim of sexual and physical abuse by an adult in a children’s home where he stayed for a couple of weeks after skipping school.
He then ran away and began a life of stealing cars and criminality, which he said led to him being pursued by both the police and the IRA.
“It was a very lonely place…I couldn’t tell anyone why or what happened to me or why I ended up running away”, he told The Nolan Show.
“No one ever asked me the question: Why did you do it?”
When he was 15 he was attacked by a gang of masked men, who said they were punishing him for stealing cars.
They beat him unconscious with hammers and hurls.
Two years later, he said, he was taken to a house in the Springhill area of Belfast, held there for eight hours and shot in the knees.
Mr Barker said a man put a gun at his kneecap and after one failed attempt, his kneecap “blew”, causing unbearable pain.
After another attempt and the gun jamming, he said the men decided to drop paving slabs on him to break his legs.
“They done me, they beat me and then the whole area shunned me”, he said.
“They busted my main artery so I had to have three operations in one week”.
“I could have lost my leg or died.”
Mr Barker, who has a conviction for blackmail, said he had to twice learn to walk again.
“I couldn’t get a job… I had no sense of hope and fear, always twitching and looking behind me,” he told The Nolan Show.
“I’ve now isolated myself at the other side of town.”
Kneecap rappers ‘don’t represent me’
Mr Barker said he wanted to speak up now was because people “need to know what a person that has been kneecapped have been through”.
“Kneecapping to me has been blocked out of people’s minds, blocked out of people’s memories…victims of punishments have been made to look like lepers in society,” he said.
The rap trio Kneecap was formed in 2017 by three friends who go by the stage names of Mo Chara, Móglaí Bap and DJ Próvaí.
Their rise to fame inspired a semi-fictionalised film starring Oscar-nominated actor Michael Fassbender.
The film won a British Academy of Film Award (Bafta) in February 2025.
Recently they have been the subject of controversy over comments made at their concerts.
One video showed them shouting “up Hamas, up Hezbollah” while another, from a November 2023 gig, shows one person from the band saying: “The only good Tory is a dead Tory. Kill your local MP.”
Kneecap said they had never supported Hamas or Hezbollah and would not incite violence against any individual.
They said the video in question was taken out of context.
“The name Kneecap tells me they are representing kneecap victims. Are they? No they are not,” Mr Barker said.
“They are not representing me or anybody like me. Nowhere near it. They are abusing people’s disabilities and mental health.”
“They need to know what a person that has been kneecapped had been through.
“They have been making a living out of other people’s misery.”
“Kneecaping is a life of mental and physical trauma.
“That’s what being kneecapped is. People don’t see that, they think a couple of bullet holes and away you go.”
