James Pratt Craig, Northern Irish loyalist paramilitary during the Troubles in Northern Ireland, is born in Belfast on November 17, 1941.

Craig, known as Jim, grows up in an Ulster Protestant family on the Shankill Road. In the early 1970s, he, a former boxer, is sent to the HM Prison Maze for a criminal offence unrelated to paramilitary activities. While serving his sentence at the Maze he joins the Ulster Defence Association (UDA), and is asked by the organisation’s commander at the time, Charles Harding Smith, to take control of the UDA prisoners inside, on account of his reputation as a “hard man.”

After his release in 1976, Craig sets up a large protection racket and becomes the UDA’s chief fundraiser. By 1985, he has managed to blackmail and extort money from a number of construction firms, building sites, as well as pubs, clubs, and shops in Belfast and elsewhere in Northern Ireland, whose intimidated owners pay protection money out of fear of Craig and his associates. It is alleged that the UDA receives hundreds of thousands of pounds, some of which also find their way inside Craig’s pockets as part of his “commission.” He is acquitted on a firearm charge and Ulster Freedom Fighters (a cover name for the UDA) membership on March 18, 1982. In 1985, he is brought to court after a number of businessmen decide to testify against him, with the condition that their identities remained hidden. The case falls apart when Craig’s defence argues that his client’s rights were violated by the concealment of the witnesses’ identities.

Craig allegedly is involved in the double killing of a Catholic man and a Protestant man on the Shankill Road in 1977. The men, both colleagues, had entered a loyalist club and were later stabbed, shot and put into a car which was set on fire. By this time the UDA West Belfast Brigade no longer wants him in their ranks, as they claim they can no longer “afford him.” Craig, who is ordered to leave the Shankill Road, goes on to join forces with John McMichael’s South Belfast Brigade. In addition to being the principal fundraiser, he also sits on the UDA’s Inner Council. He usually travels in the company of his bodyguard, Artie Fee, a UDA member from the Shankill Road.

The rival Ulster Volunteer Force (UVF) carries out an investigation after it is rumoured Craig has been involved in the death of UVF major William Marchant, who is gunned down by Provisional Irish Republican Army gunmen from a passing car on the Shankill Road on April 28, 1987. Marchant is the third high-ranking UVF man to be killed by the IRA during the 1980s. Although their inquiries reveal that Craig had quarrelled with Marchant as well as Lenny Murphy and John Bingham prior to their killings, the UVF feel that there is not enough evidence to warrant an attack on such a powerful UDA figure as Craig.

In December 1987, when UDA South Belfast brigadier John McMichael is blown up by an IRA booby-trap car bomb outside his home in Lisburn‘s Hilden estate, it is believed that Craig had organised his death with the IRA. Allegedly Craig fears McMichael is about to expose his racketeering business, thus putting an end to his lucrative operation. McMichael reportedly sets up an inquiry and discovers that Craig is spending money on a lavish scale, going on holidays at least twice a year and indulging in a “champagne lifestyle.” At the same time, it is suggested that Craig has made certain deals with Irish republican paramilitary groups, dividing up the rackets in west Belfast, and he would be doing the IRA a favour by helping them to eliminate a high-profile loyalist such as McMichael. Craig has established links with republicans during his time in prison, and the profitable deals and exchanges of information between them ensures he will most likely not be a target for IRA assassination.

Craig is named as an extortionist in Central Television’s 1987 programme The Cook Report. He plans to sue the programme’s producers for libel. In January 1988, Jack Kielty (father of future television presenter Patrick Kielty), a building contractor from County Down who had promised to testify as a key witness against Craig, is murdered by the UDA. This killing is attributed to Craig, although it is never proven.

Craig is shot dead by two gunmen from the UDA in “The Castle Inn” (later called “The Bunch of Grapes”), a pub in Beersbridge Road, east Belfast on October 15, 1988, where he has been lured in the belief that there is to be a UDA meeting. He is playing pool in the pub at the time of his fatal shooting by the two men, both of whom are wearing boilersuits and ski masks and carrying automatic weapons. Upon spotting Craig they open fire, spraying the room with gunfire. Craig dies instantly. A bystander pensioner is also murdered in the attack, and four other bystanders are wounded by stray bullets. The UDA claims the killing is carried out due to Craig’s “treason” and involvement in John McMichael’s murder as they know he had provided the IRA with information to successfully carry out the assassination. They apologise for the unintentional death of the pensioner. Craig is not given a paramilitary funeral, and none of the UDA’s command attend it.