A SCOTS SAS hero who died while working abroad will be brought home this weekend after a two-week wait to repatriate him.
Army veteran John McAleese – who helped bring an end to the Iranian embassy siege in London in May 1980 – died after a suspected heart attack while working in Greece.
His daughter Hayley, 28, said last night that she was “very, very happy” that her father’s body was finally being brought home.
She added that the 60-year-old was expected home on Saturday and said: “So glad to know when my father is due home.”
Miss McAleese said that the family are now in the process of finalising her father’s funeral service, which will take place in Hereford where Mr McAleese, who was originally from Laurieston in Falkirk, lived with his family for many years.
John’s brother Billy McAleese, who still lives in Falkirk, added that the whole family is relieved that the former soldier is finally being brought home.
He said: “He’ll be brought back and obviously we’re all very relieved. But we then need to wait before arrangements are made. It depends on the coroner – whether or not he wants to hold a post-mortem.”
Mr McAleese – who also lost his mother-in-law earlier this week – said the last fortnight has been hard for the family, and that he was shocked to learn of his brother’s death.
Prior to his death, John McAleese had struggled to come to terms with the death of his son Paul, a soldier who was killed by a roadside bomb in Afghanistan two years ago.
His daughter claimed that the stress of her brother’s death may have contributed to her father’s suspected heart problems and subsequent death.
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules hereComments are closed on this article