BELFAST, Northern Ireland (AP) — Prosecutors say the case has collapsed against the man charged with the murder of 29 people in Omagh in 1998, scene of the deadliest bombing in the history of the Northern Ireland conflict.

Seamus Daly has been held without bail since his 2014 arrest. He faced 29 murder counts over the unsolved attack on the Northern Ireland town by the Real IRA, an Irish Republican Army faction opposed to the British territory's peace process. A car bomb detonated in a crowd, killing mostly women and children.

Daly pleaded guilty to Real IRA membership in a Dublin court in 2004 and served a short Republic of Ireland sentence.

In 2009, a Belfast civil jury found Daly and three other Real IRA figures responsible for the bombing. They refused to pay damages.