The Nolans

David Nolan (29), a father of five, was jailed for 4 years by Judge Carroll Moran on 4 June after pleading guilty to threatening to kill a woman in Southill back in October 2006. Nolan arrived at the woman’s house at Maigue Way, waving a samurai sword telling her "I'll kill you and I'll kill your son", and, furthermore, kill her other son "Michael Campbell Mc style in a field".  Nolan broke the woman’s front window with his sword. A month after this, the O’Donoghue’s house was burnt out, though it was not suggested Nolan was involved.

Nolan also pleaded guilty to a charge of possession of heroin for sale or supply at a house in Ardbracken, Kilteragh, at 10pm on January 16, 2009. He was found with 40 small bags of heroin in his pocket, claiming he had to deal drug because of his escalating debts.

Nolan was confident of a custodial sentence from the Judge, and arrived in court with his bags packed. He was sentenced to 4 years for the heroin possession and a concurrent 3 years for threatening to kill.

David Nolan has 3 previous convictions for dealing heroin. He was caught red handed in a car on Hartstonge Street with €400 worth of heroin in February 2007. He was also found to be driving under the influence of cannabis and cocaine on that occasion.  In October 2007, Nolan was caught again, with €500 worth of heroin in a house at Lawn Way, Carew Park. Nolan was also up on charges of assaulting a woman, Linda Casey, outside her home in O’Malley Park, Southill in August 2007, but she developed amnesia in the stand during the trial in December 2007and that charge was struck out. Nolan, with 33 previous convictions, was sentenced to 8 months imprisonment.

Seven months later, Linda Casey herself was arrested in a downstairs bedroom of a house in Brú Na Gruadáin, Castletroy where she was busy bagging some €1,500 worth of heroin. Ms. Casey (43), with 58 previous convictions, was sentenced to 10 months imprisonment by Judge Tom O’Donnell.

David Nolan’s 2006 threat to Ms. O’Donoghue’s son, that he would killer her son "Michael Campbell Mc style in a field" had particular resonance as his relative, Andrew Nolan, is still the only person convicted in relation to the 2003 murder of Michael Campbell McNamara.

Andrew Nolan (29), originally charged with withholding information, later pleaded guilty in court to “engaging in conduct causing a substantial risk of death or serious harm”. He admitted his role in luring Michael Campbell McNamara to Southill to his death back in October 2003, telling the victim he had a sawn-off shotgun for sale.

Andrew Nolan

Campbell McNamara's body was later found in Barry’s Field with his hands and feet bound. He had been stabbed ten times and shot twice. His car had been seen near the Nolan’s home on Ashe Avenue, Carew Park, and was later found burnt out in Fedamore, County Limerick.


Andrew Nolan, a former baker and a father of 3, had 27 prior convictions. His early guilty plea was taken into account and Judge Carroll Moran sentenced him to four years in prison at Limerick Circuit Court.

Another relative, also David Nolan (45), and at the same Carew Park address as Andrew, was convicted in 2007 for possession of a 9mm Glock semi-automatic pistol and ammunition for two other pistols at a house in Star Court, Carew Park. Gardaí found a handgun in a rubbish bag and ammunition in the hot press when they searched the house, in November 2005. This David Nolan was sentenced to 2 years by Judge Moran.

The Ryans (Part 2)

On Thursday, 23 January 2003, Eddie Ryan (20) and his younger brother, Kieran (19) became the centre of national attention.

That afternoon, Kieran Ryan was attacked outside Limerick Courthouse, where he was on trial for serious assault charges and two counts of being in possession of a knife on March 5th, 2002 in Limerick City centre. That case collapsed after the main witness and victim, Liam Keane, waivered in the witness stand, becoming unable to identify exactly who had stabbed him in the back, despite previous statements to Gardaí insisting it was Kieran Ryan.  Judge Carroll Moran told the court he had "no alternative" but to direct the jury to find the accused not guilty, remarking that, "It is a very sorry state of affairs that this should happen and if this is going to persist we are going to live in a state of social chaos and anarchy."

Later the day, at around 10:30pm, the Ryan brothers were strolling down Moylish Avenue, Ballynanty, with their friend Christopher 'Smokie' Costello, when a black car pulled up just 30 yards from Costello’s home. Two masked men, armed with a shotgun and a handgun, jumped out and bundled the Ryans into the car.  Costello later told Gardaí he had struggled free and escaped despite being shot at. After raising the alarm, he was briefly admitted to hospital. 

Eddie Junior and Kieran Ryan in 2003

A large search began for the Ryan brothers, involving a Garda helicopter, an airplane, the Garda Sub-Aqua Unit and over 100 soldiers from Sarsfield Barracks, Limerick and Kickham Barracks, Clonmel. Soon, the search focussed on wasteland in and around Moyross and around Cratloe, County Clare, as it became increasingly likely the Ryan brothers may have been killed and dumped in a remote location. 

Journalists became frequent visitors to the Ryan family home on Hogan Avenue, Kileely and Mary Ryan appeared on national television calling for the return of her children. She was quoted as saying to those who took her children, "The devil is in you. You are evil. May a widow's curse be on you for the rest of your life."

Christopher ‘Smokie’ Costello, who described himself as the ‘best friend’ of the brothers told the press that he was "lucky to be alive. By rights I should be dead." He added, “I won't stop till I find them."

Pleas for the safe return of the brothers were made by the then Justice Minister, Michael McDowell, the then Bishop of Limerick Donal Murray, Junior Minister Willie O’Dea and Alderman Michael Kelly.

Kieran Ryan’s 17 year old partner, Edel O’Neill told one newspaper, on Monday the 27th, of her fear that Kieran would never see his daughter, Kelsey, again ("He got the name from a doll's box he saw somewhere", she added).

That same day, there was a fight outside the city’s courthouse. Inside the Circuit Court, as details of an attack with an AK-47 on ‘Fat’ John McCarthy, cousin of the Ryans, was discussed,  a brawl broke out among 20 people from both sides of the feud outside, with Gardaí arresting 7.

By Tuesday the 28th of January, Limerick Chief Superintendent Gerry Kelly insisted the search for the brothers would continue, but admitted that it was increasingly likely they were dead.

However, at 3am, January 30, 2003, Eddie Ryan, and his brother Kieran walked into Portlaoise Garda Station, some 70 miles from Limerick, and told Gardaí, "We're the boys who were abducted." Apparently the two were hooded the whole week they were abducted, though one newspaper noted that they still managed to shave during their ordeal.  Gardaí brought them to Henry Street Garda Station where their mother waited for them. Kieran Ryan to the media, "I'm just happy to be alive and to see my whole family, especially my baby daughter." When pressed for details he added,  "I got threatened and I'm not going to talk to no-one about it. I've been threatened not to talk."

It was originally thought that the Keane-Collopy gang had taken the two boys and, since kidnapping isn’t a typical feature in the Limerick feuds, it was reasonably assumed by Gardaí and others that they were killed and dumped.

It is now commonly accepted that the McCarthy-Dundons ‘kidnapped’ the Ryan brothers, perhaps offering them to the Keane-Collopy gang for a price of €50,000 or more.  The Dundons then tried to lure Kieran Keane and Philip Collopy to a house in Garyowen, but Owen Treacy arrived with Keane instead of Collopy.  Thinking they were on their way to execute the Ryans, Keane and Treacy travelled willingly with members of the McCarthy-Dundon gang out to the remote area of Drumbanna (this point was never emphasised at the subsequent trial or appeal as it was in no ones interests to mention it!).  Here, Keane was shot dead, and, when the gun jammed, Treacy was stabbed 17 times and, mistakenly, left for dead.

 Kieran Keane

One of the group of five involved in killing Kieran Keane and stabbing Owen Treacy was Christopher ‘Smokie’ Costelloe, best friend of the Ryan brothers.  Costello was credited as one of the two men who stabbed Owen Treacy up to 17 times.  In court, James McCarthy and Christopher Costello asserted they were both watching a football match between Liverpool and Arsenal in a house at 66, College Park in Corbally. That match, at Anfield, was a 2-2 draw, with Heskey scoring a 90th minute equaliser. Charged with murder in June 2003, Costello, was given a life sentence for killing Kieran Keane, 7 years for false imprisonment and 12 years for the attempted murder of Owen Treacy.

 Christopher 'Smokie' Costello

After losing an appeal in the Court of Criminal Appeal in July 2007, Costello and his four co-accused were this week denied permission to bring the case to the Supreme Court.

The Ryan brothers were ‘released’ just 6 hours after Kieran Keane was murdered, returning home for a celebration.  Mary Ryan, who was once headbutted by Kieran Keane, told journalists , “Nothing will compensate you for your children, and I want to thank everyone who went out searching.” Her brother-in-law, John Ryan, referring to the Keanes, added, “If they want to call it quits then we'll call it quits. If they don't then that's they're own problem, we don't want any more trouble…It's a deal gone wrong for the other crowd. It's their own fault."

Six months later, John Ryan died after being shot four times outside a house in Thomondgate.

Shane Mason

Shane Mason appeared in court via video link from Limerick Prison on Thursday, 3 June last. Mason was originally charged at a special sitting of Limerick District Court on Wednesday evening, 26 May with possession of a firearm and ammunition with intent to endanger life.  The charges relate to the attempt on Daniel Phillips’ life on Monday evening, 24 May last.  Philips (20), from Crecora Avenue, Ballinacurra Weston remains in hospital in Cork University Hospital after receiving gunshot wounds to the head and chest in St. John’s Square as he sat in a car with 2 other men. After firing 7 shots, the gunman made his escape on a bicycle.

Daniel Phillips

Mason was arrested within an hour or two of the shooting. Another man and a woman were also arrested but later released. The Limerick Leader noted the shooting on Daniel Phillips was on Mason’s 28th birthday.

Shane Mason, originally from Sean Heuston Place, has lived in Moyross in recent times. A cousin of Collopys, he’s been attacked twice in recent months by northside criminals.

On Friday night, 23 January last, Mason was shot on Kileely Road at about 10:15, when crowds were still leaving the Munster v. Northampton final pool game in the Heineken Cup. Mason, who was a passenger in a stationary car, received pellet wounds in the shoulder and head after two shots were fired from a shotgun by a gunman on foot. The female driver, apparently Mason’s girlfriend, drove the car to Hasset’s Cross where Gardaí were still on match duty. Mason’s injuries weren’t life threatening.

The next attempt on Shane Mason’s life was on 10 May. At around 11 that night, in Cathedral Place, a man in the rear of a blue carolla, fitted with a stolen taxi roof sign, fired once at Mason, missing him. The car was found burned out some time later in Patrickswell. Three men were arrested but not charged.

Gardaí advised Mason on his personal security but its now alleged he took matters into his own hands.

Shane Mason, who recently celebrated his birthday

Mason would not be particularly popular with local Gardaí. On 9 July 2004, Mason assaulted a Guard outside Limerick City Courthouse as the Guard tried to arrest him.  A year later Judge Carroll Moran jailed Mason for 2 years for that offence and for escaping custody on the same date.

In October 2004, David Heighton, of Colmcille Street, St. Mary’s Park, initially identified Shane Mason as the gunman who inflicted serious injuries on his face and chest.  The shooting had the hallmarks of another internal dispute within the greater Collopy-Keane gang. On 9 October 2004, in the early hours of a Wednesday morning, Heighton was shot near the shops on St. Ita’s Street, St. Mary’s Park, after an earlier altercation with a man.  His injuries resulted in him becoming blind in one eye and losing a section of an ear.  He had some 60 shotgun pellets removed from the side of his head and needed reconstructive surgery on his face. While Heighton’s initial statements to Guards unambiguously fingered Mason as the shooter, in court he insisted he wasn’t so sure.  Under new legislation (the Criminal Justice Act, 2006), the State was allowed use Heighton’s earlier statements to Gardaí as evidence. Nonetheless, Mason was found not guilty by a unanimous vote of the jury.

The legislation that allowed Heighton’s original Garda statements insisting Mason shot him back in 2004 to be used in Mason's 2007 trial was based on legislation introduced in the wake of the collapse of Liam Keane’s trial for the killing of Eric Leamy in 2003, where widespread intimidation and ‘collective amnesia’ in the witness stand was suggested by the judge

Liam Keane

Heighton was not unfamiliar to Gardaí prior to his shooting.  Aged 19, back in 1997, he was arrested for joyriding after a student Garda, John Keating tried to stop the stolen car Heighton was in on the Hyde Road, Prospect. The student Garda suffered a broken hip and collar bones. The other Guard on patrol was beaten by a mob as he attempted to arrest the suspects. Heighton was charged with taking a car without consent and driving without insurance.

In June 2004, just a few months before he was shot, Heighton was arrested after being caught drunk on the back of a crashed stolen motorbike on the Old Cork Road in the early hours with his friend, Liam Keane.

Shane Mason was remanded in custody by Judge Tom O'Donnell until 17 June.

The Ryans (Part 1)

Brothers Eddie (27) and Kieran Ryan (26) were charged with possession of a 9mm Browning semi-automatic pistol and 15 rounds of ammunition at Carrigmartin, Ballyneety, Co Limerick, on 26 May, contrary to section 27(a) of the Firearms Act, 1964.  Also charged was John Collins (18) from 23 Monabraher Road, Ballynanty. The Ryan brothers, from Hogan Avenue, Kileely were only stopped by Gardaí from the Emergency Response Unit after their Toyota Avensis was rammed out in Ballyneety.  There is some speculation that they were out to avenge the recent shooting of Daniel Phillips.

While the Ryan brothers never really went away, their profile has been lower in recent years.

It’s nearly 10 years, in November 2000, when their father, Eddie Senior, was gunned down in the Moose Bar by the Keane-Collopy gang – specifically by Kieran Keane and Philip Collopy. Kieran Ryan, then just 17, was in the bar’s bathroom when the gunmen came into the Moose Bar and shot his father, Eddie Ryan Senior. Eddie’s wife, Mary, was 7 weeks pregnant at the time.

Eddie Ryan Senior

Eddie Senior had a long record of his own, from appearing in court on burglary charges when he was just 13, to being arrested and charged with murder when he was just 17, back in 1977. By then he had already some 12 previous convictions.

Eddie Senior then lived in Cregan Avenue, Kileely, just one road over from the Ryan familiy’s current home on Hogan Avenue.  On a Sunday night, 29 May 1977, when Ryan and a friend were going to a dance in a city centre hotel, they came across Christopher Jackson (24), from Raheen Square, Ballinacurra Weston. 

Jackson stood outside Cruises Hotel on Patrick’s Street. After a brief exchange ("I heard you were looking for me" "I wasn't" "There's rumours going round that you were" "I wasn't", etc.), Jackson punched Ryan in the face. Ryan ran off towards Roches Stores, promising Jackson he wouldn’t forget that.  Jackson followed, saying to his friend, "I'll be back in a minute. I want to give this fellow something to think about". Jackson apparently pulled a razor on Ryan, while Ryan pulled out a knife, but kept backing off towards Sarsfield Bridge.  He turned up Henry Street, then up Bedford Row, by the Savoy Theatre.  Outside the Grand Central cinema, Jackson called to Eddie Ryan, saying they should just forget about fighting and shake on it.  As they went to shake hands, Jackson swiped at Ryan but missed.  Ryan lunged at him, stabbing him in the face. The fight moved back down towards the Savoy.  Jackson cut Ryan’s fingers but Ryan gave him a “dig or two with the knife”, “somewhere on the front of his body”, perforating Jackson’s heart twice. As Ryan ran away, Jackson fell back against a parked car before collapsing to the ground.

The old Savoy, closed in 1974, demolished 1988

 One passer-by, Dermot Cronin, later recounted at the trial how he had tried to phone the Guards as the two fought but had run to 3 different phone boxes before finding one that worked.

Gardaí later found blood stains for 20 yards leading to the Bedford Flats, as well as blood on the walls and windows of the outside of the lower flats themselves. The State pathologist, Professor John Harbison, found 7 stab wounds on Jackson, including the two that penetrated his heart, causing death by internal haemorrhaging.

Gardaí located Ryan at his sister’s house in the early hours of the following morning.  The bloodied jacket, with the knife in the pocket, were downstairs on the washing machine, though Ryan told the arresting officer, Inspector Jeremiah O’Sullivan, he had never seen them before.  Ryan was brought in for questioning and, at 8 in the morning, a ‘cool and relaxed’ Ryan admitted to Gardaí he had stabbed Jackson.  Garda John Quinn,who had seen Ryan flee the scene, also picked him in an identity parade.

Eddie Ryan, described in court as ‘easily led’, was originally charged with murder, but was found not guilty by a jury after just 3 hours of deliberation.  Ryan did, however, plead guilty to manslaughter.  His barrister, a Limerick man, Kevin O’Higgins (now a judge in the European Court of Justice), arguing before sentencing, insisted that Ryan was ‘a disadvantaged person, with no specific educational attainments, nor had he any skills that would enable him to obtain employment, even if employment were available in Limerick City.’

Justice Sean Glennon, at the Dublin Central Criminal Court, sentenced Ryan to five years penal servitude with no leave to appeal.

Former 'cattle beater' back in court

On 21 May, Patrick Byrnes (31) was jailed for contempt of court by Judge Joseph Mangan at Ennis District Court after repeatedly interrupting a Garda’s evidence, insisting, this 'was lies'.  Byrnes, with an address in Kilmihill, West Clare, but originally from the south side of Limerick City, was in court facing 4 charges after allegedly stealing a neighbours car and crashing it in a pedestrian street in Ennis town centre after a 20 kilometre car chase by Gardaí. Gardaí indicated more charges are likely.

The jeep allegedly taken taken by Byrnes

Byrnes was arrested at 4:30 on the afternoon of Wednesday the 19th of May after allegedly ramming a black Kia Sorrento jeep into a bollard and a shop front on Market Street in Ennis. He had previously allegedly taken the jeep at knifepoint from its owner Denis Considine back in Kilmihil.  Byrnes later allegedly refused to provide a blood or urine sample to Gardai at an Ennis Garda Station. After the crash, Byrnes is alleged to have reached for his knife before being restrained by the Gardai with pepper spray.

Byrens, a father of 3, has numerous previous conditions.  Formerly of Lisheen Park, Patrickswell, he was jailed in 2003 for spitting at a Guard. On 29 August that year, Gardaí were called to a disturbance at Punches’ Cross, in Limerick City, where they came across a drunken aggressive Byrnes stripped to the waist. After his arrest, he assaulted 2 Gardaí.  Appearing in court the following September, he also faced charges of possessing a balaclava, an iron bar, a rubber hose and other weapons when stopped at a Garda checkpoint on the Dock Road in early August 2003.  Byrnes insisted the iron bar and rubber hose were for beating cattle. Already with 30 convictions, Byrnes was sentence to 6 months by Judge Tom O’Donnell.

 Patrick Byrnes

In 2005, Byrnes was back in court, this time with his dad, Patrick Byrnes Senior, then 46. Father and son, along with another man, Patrick Higgins, were charged with possession of a firearm for unlawful purposes at Lisheen Park, Patrickswell on 30 May 2005. They pleaded guilty to involvement in the shooting of Edward Harty outside his home in Patrickswell by masked gunmen after mistakenly believing Harty was a passenger in a car that killed Higgins’ brother, Robert (31) who crashed his car into a ditch in Rosbrien on 25 May 2005.  The Irish Independent described the shooting as 'an escalating feud between a local Traveller family and a Limerick crime gang'. Patrick Senior and his son were sentenced to 6 years in March 2006.

Mark Connery's long career

On the 7th of May, Mark Connery (37) of Lenihan Avenue, Ballinacurra Weston, pleaded guilty at Limerick Circuit Court to the attempted robbery of a city centre antiques store.  On 13 September 2009, Connery and an accomplice, both masked, tried to rob Noonan Antiques on Ellen Street, when the owner Mr. Jim Noonan, grabbed a gun that was pointed at him and chased away both men.  The pistol turned out to be a blank.

 Noonan's Antiques of Ellen Street

Mark Connery was later identified by Gardai from nearby CCTV footage. He has numerous previous convictions, has never worked and has a history of drug addiction.  However, the leader of a Bedford Row drugs project gave evidence of good recent progress made by Connery. He is due for sentencing on 22 June.

In August 1987, Connery, then just 15, was involved in the killing of a 26 year old man called Christopher McInerney, in O’Malley Park.   McInerney was stabbed in the neck after he hit Connery’s father over the head with a pole. Connery and another juvenile were originally charged at a special court in Roxboro Garda station.  After being found guilty of manslaughter in 1988, Connery received a 4-year suspended sentence, which was later activated when he was convicted of other charges shortly afterwards.

Interestingly, one of Connery’s co-accused, Anthony Kiely, killed again in December 1994, when he inflicted a fatal stab wound to the heart of 23 year old Patrick McNamara in Southill.

Connery was back in the news in January 1997, when he and two friends attacked and damaged the gravestone of the late Detective Garda Jerry McCabe in Mount St. Oliver cemetery. Connery, then 24, was charged at Nenagh District Court  for causing £150 worth of damage to the headstone. Connery was also charged with riotous and violent behaviour.  For what the judge called ‘mean and disgusting’ behaviour, Mark Connery received a 10 month sentence in March 1997 for damaging Detective McCabe’s headstone.

Also convicted in relation to the damage was Melvin McNamara, who though only 17, was judged to be the ringleader. Melvin went on to unsuccessfully rob a post office in Castleconnell in October 2006.  As an aside, Melvin’s brother, Trevor, was murdered in Southill in 2002 in circumstances related to a boil-in-the-bag curry.

A "complete and utter waster"

Limerickman Kieran Cummins (22) received a 9-month sentence at Castlebar District Court last week.  Cummins, a business studies student at the Castlebar campus of GMIT, was before the court on a series of charges.

On 4th February last he was arrested at 6:20 early Thursday morning, as he walked up a residential road in Castlebar carrying an iron bar in each hand. When confronted he told the Guard to “fuck off and mind your own business”. Cummins later explained he was frustrated after being attacked by a student at a house party earlier that night.

On 24th March, Cummins met Gardaí again when they discovered him in a stolen car stuck on a residential green at 12:45 in the morning.  Cummins told the court that he had been at another house party and had passed the unlocked car on his way home.  He said he had no recollection of taking the car.  He refused to provide the Guards with a blood or urine sample at the station.

Cummins was already disqualified from driving for three years and had 10 previous convictions.  Judge Mary Devins called Cummins and ‘complete and utter waster”, adding that she had “zilch sympathy for him”. Cummins received fines totalling €2,500 and a six year driving disqualification in addition to the 9 month sentence.  Cummins was allowed serve his sentence in Limerick prison.

Cummins recently pleaded guilty in Limerick District Court to violent disorder, along with 2 others.  Cummins and his co-accused were guilty of using or threatening to use unlawful violence causing another person to fear for their life at Ballinvoher, Father Russell Road on the 28th May 2007.  Kieran Cummins is due for sentencing for that offence in July.

Limerick’s scariest soccer team?

Just over three weeks ago (3/04/10), the Limerick Post published a photo in their ‘Club Corner’ sports pages, featuring a team from a memorial soccer tournament, remembering Ger Hehir and Michelle Collins - car accident victims, in May 2009, from two prominent Limerick families involved in the McCarthy-Dundon gang.

Last weekend, 8 alleged members of the McCarthy-Dundon gang were charged with various offences, including 5 featured in the team photo above.

1. Ger Dundon (25) of Hyde Road, Limerick, charged with committing violent order at Sarsfield Avenue, Garryowen, on February 17th 2010 

2. Jimmy Collins (47), of Crecora Avenue, Limerick, charged with threatening to kill or cause serious harm to Mark Heffernan on October 17th 2009 at the Milk Market, Limerick, and with demanding money with menaces on the same date. 

3. Dave McCormack (25) , Crecora Avenue, Weston, Limerick charged with committing violent order at Sarsfield Avenue, Garryowen, on February 17th 2010.

4. Christopher McCarthy (27) Crecora Avenue, Limerick, is charged with threatening to kill or cause serious harm to Mark Heffernan on October 17th 2009 at the Milk Market, Limerick, and with demanding money with menaces on the same date.

5. Gareth Collins (27), Hyde Avenue, Limerick, like his dad, Jimmy, is also charged with threatening to kill or cause serious harm to Mark Heffernan on October 17th 2009 at the Milk Market, Limerick, and with demanding money with menaces on the same date. Collins is also charged with committing violent order at Sarsfield Avenue, Garryowen, on February 17th 2010.

Michael Bridgemen (51), Christopher McCormack (brother of Dave) and Patrick Pickford were also charged.

Shoplift around!

The Galway Advertiser newspaper this week highlights the recent activities of Mary Ryan, a Limerick woman, in Galway City (‘Limerick woman caught in cheeky shop-lifting spree’). Mary Ryan, also known as Mary O’Brien or Mary Ryan O’Brien, with an address at Sharwood Estate, Newcastle West, had 108 previous convictions prior to these latest charges.  On 13th March last, she managed to shoplift some €1,700 worth of goods from two Galway premises.  Mary was arrested at 10.20 on the morning of the 13th of March last at Tescos in Galway Shopping Centre. Later that day, she was arrested again, at 1:20 after she refused to leave Hartmann’s Jewellers. Gardaí search her and found cosmetics stolen from Flanagan’s Pharmacy.

That 13th March, a Saturday, was a particularly busy one for Mary.  At 6.10 pm, Mary was arrested for the 3rd time that day, this time in Debenhams, and charged with theft of over €2,000 worth of goods and criminal damage to those items she had ripped the security tag off. Later, Mary’s solicitor informed the court that she was the mother of a 3-year old child, and that her husband had been killed in a crash in 2009 and that she was on medication.

Mary in Galway, as she moved from (A) Tescos to (B) Flanagan’s Pharmacy to

(C) Hartmann’s Jewellers and finally to (D) Debenhams.

Not illustrated: Mary’s trips to the Garda station after A, C & D

Mary Ryan’s shoplifting habit goes back a long way, at least to October 2002.  Back then, the Kerryman newspaper reported that Mary Ryan, then 19, stole clothes to the value of €229.70 from a shop on Main Street, Cahersiveen. Her solicitor explained that she had just run away from home and realised she needed some clothes.  Judge Humphrey Kelleher fined her €40.

Fast forward to 2008. On the 11th of September that year, Mary stole €1,000 of cosmetics from Rosedale Pharmacy in Dooradoyle, and two months later, a further €200 of goods from the Body Shop in the Crescent Shopping Centre in Limerick on 11th November 2008.  She also swiped a crystal carriage clock from Carrig Donn that same day. By the time these offences came to court, in May 2009, Mary was also charged with being a passenger in a stolen car in Pineview Gardens, Moyross. 

Though her solicitor, John Devane, ask for leniency for the ‘young mother of two’ who ‘had fallen on hard times’, Judge Tom O’Donnell suggested she was hiding behind her children. Judge O’Donnell also addressed her failure to turn up in court on previous occasions. Her solicitor explained that her child had medical appointments at Temple Street Children’s Hospital in Dublin on those dates.  However, after Garda inquiries, it was discovered that no such appointments existed and Temple Street hospital had no record of her or her children.

She was sentenced to 6 months imprisonment.

On January 30, 2009, Mary was questioned by Gardaí about the theft of €760 worth of cosmetics and perfumes from Dooley’s Pharmacy in Newcastle West.  According to the Kerryman newspaper, minutes after being questioned and released by Gardaí, she stole €30 of groceries from a nearby petrol station. This was happened while Mary was on temporary release from prison after being sentenced to 4 months imprisonment at Kilmallock District Court, on 18 December 2008, for theft. Judge Mary O’Halloran, at Listowel District Court, was told by the defence solicitor that Mary Ryan O’Brien was under the influence of drugs at the time and she had already sold on all of the stolen goods. She was sentenced to 5 months imprisonment.  The judge suggested that prison governors offering her early release ‘doesn’t help the court in the carrying out of justice.’

In November 2009, Mary Ryan O’Brien was back in court – this time in Limerick District Court - charged with stealing €462 worth of goods from Keating’s Pharmacy Dooradoyle in April 2009 after she was identified on CCTV by Gardaí.  Defending O’Brien, solicitor Sarah Ryan remarked that her client was not in receipt of social welfare and was not stealing the goods for her own use, “but to move on so she could get the money to support herself” (Limerick Post, 7/11/09). Judge Tom O’Donnell sentenced Mary to 10 months, suspended for 2 years. The Limerick Post noted that Ryan-O’Brien was currently serving a separate sentence and not due for release until 23rd March 2010 – some ten days after she was arrested in Galway.

Mary Ryan-O’Brien has interesting housemate.  One of her two addresses, 17 Sharwood Estate, Newcastle West, is also home to John Ryan. John, with at least 80 previous convictions of his own, was convicted of possession of a knife back in 2007 and was fortunate to get a suspended sentence last January for public order and theft offences.  He told Judge Mary O’Halloran, at Newcastle West District Court, that he’d rather go to hell than back to jail.  One of his offences involved stealing three bottles of alcohol from the Carry Out Off Licence in Newcastle West,  When confronted by staff, he told them, “I can't pay, I'm late for court, don't call the guards” before leaving.

The second address given by Mary Ryan O’Brien to various district courts around the country is 11, Raheen Square, Ballinacurra Weston. This residence is a big step up for a serial shoplifter, being the home of the Hehirs, a family with close connections to the Dundon-McCarthy gang. Darren Hehir is currently serving 3 years for firearms charges, while his brother Joe was recently arrested with Ger Dundon for tailing a prison van.  He is also romantically linked with Ger’s sister, Annabel. Both Joe and Darren were shot last year, apparently by other members of the Dundon-McCarthy gang.

Brennan and Baby

Some weeks ago, on the 26th of March, Liam ‘Baby’ Kelly and another man, Robert Crawford, were convicted in Rathkeale District Court after pleading guilty to burglary, criminal damage and possession of housebreaking tools.  Gardaí came across the two, plus another man (who pleaded not guilty), while they attempted to break into several cars at Newcastle West Autos at 2.45 in the morning of Thursday, 25th March last. Both Kelly (22), currently living at Broadleaf Apartments on Broad Street and Crawford (18) received six months sentences.

Liam Kelly is the brother of the late Aidan Kelly, shot dead in May 2006.

Liam was previously jailed for 3 months in 2007, for driving dangerously and failing to stop for Guards in St. Mary’s Park in August of that year.  2007 was an interesting year for Liam ‘Baby’ Kelly.

Liam 'Baby' Kelly

On Saturday night, 22nd September, 2007, Kelly, then living in Distillery View, Thomondgate, was drinking in what was then Dick Devane’s pub on Nicholas Street. Ian Brennan was drinking there too.  They argued over a girl who was apparently Kelly’s girlfriend, but whom Brennan was also involved with. Brennan later recalled, "I said to him; 'I don't know what you're getting bad over. She's meeting me one night and you another, that's the way she wants it.'" The girl in question, one Leeane Campbell McNamara, arrived and a fight broke out. Kelly and Campbell left the pub, now known as the Mucky Duck, soon after. 

Sometime later, at around 1:30 am early Sunday morning, Ian Brennan left the pub with friends and was on his way to a party in St. Munchin’s Street, St. Mary’s Park when he was shot twice.  He told Gardaí who arrived on the scene of the shooting shortly afterwards that Kelly had shot him.  Shortly after that, the Gardaí arrested Kelly after finding him under a child’s bed in the house of Leeane Campbell McNamara’s sister, on Oliver Plunkett Street, St. Mary’s Park.  Though it was just after 3 in the morning, Gardaí noticed a man’s tracksuit was being washed in the washing machine.

At a bail hearing on 2nd October 2007, Kelly’s solicitor, John Herbert, attempted to assure Judge Tom O’Donnell that Kelly would not interfere with potential witnesses, commenting that his client had been shot the previous June and “hadn’t tried to exact revenge” (Irish Times, 3/10/07). Kelly’s family home had been petrol-bombed that same month.

Liam ‘Baby’ Kelly went on trial at Limerick Circuit Court in November 2008 for possession of a shotgun with intent to endanger life. 

Ian Brennan testified he had been drinking in the bar with his friends, Brian Scanlon and Philip Collopy.  After they left the bar, they headed to Collopy’s house on nearby St. Munchin’s Street.  At this point, a car approached and someone with a sawn-off shotgun got out and shot Brennan twice.  Brennan insisted he was “110%” certain it was Kelly, but witnesses said the attacker wore a hood. Brennan testified how he was shot first in the back as he tried to run away and then in the stomach at close range by Kelly at about 1:45 on Sunday morning.  Brennan spent 3 weeks in hospital, including 6 days in intensive care, and lost his gall bladder, while his bowel was replaced.  Brennan claimed that, as a result of his injuries, he lost his job as a bricklayer, though the downturn in construction probably would’ve taken care of that.

Leeanne Campbell McNamara insisted she was elsewhere with her boyfriend, Kelly, at the time of the shooting.  They had gone to her sister’s house.  Kelly, she testified, was giving one of the children upstairs a bottle, when the Guards called.  Leeanne insisted Kelly had dropped the bottle and was searching for it under the bed when the Gardaí came upon him.

During the 3-day trial, after the judge warned jury members not to ‘Google’ things relating to the trial. The jury eventually informed Judge Sean O'Donnabhain they could not come to a verdict, not even a majority verdict. 

In February 2009, Liam ‘Baby’ Kelly went on trial for a second time for the same offence.  The trial lasted, again, for 3 days.  Philip Collopy testified at the trial, prompting the Judge to advise the jury that they should ignore the fact that Brennan was in the company of a friend (Collopy) wearing a bulletproof vest that night. Indeed, Collopy even wore his vest in the witness stand at the Limerick Circuit Court. Collopy famously remarked at the trial - "Sure I get shot at every week."  This was less than 2 months before Collopy accidentally shot himself in the head.

Philip Collopy

 Judge Sean O`Donnabháin, who also presided over Kelly's retrial, told the jury that the case against ‘Baby’ Kelly rested almost entirely on the visual identification made by the victim Ian Brennan. Brennan was not helped by the fact that witnesses, including his friend, Philip Collopy, insisted the gunman’s face was covered.This time the jury, after just an hour, acquitted Kelly unanimously.  The acquittal was greeted by loud cheers in the courthouse.

Incidentally, Ian Brennan seems particularly unlucky, as he previously survived another attempt to kill him (and his dad, Paddy) on the same street again with a sawn-off shotgun, two years previously, in 2005.  Back then, one William O’Neill and another man were charged, but not convicted, with trying to kill father Paddy and son, Ian Brennan. Even stranger, the same William O’Neill was, back in 2000, sentenced to 8 years for manslaughter, after, it seems, killing Paddy Brennan’s estranged wife’s boyfriend, Sean Colbert, in partner with Paddy’s older son, (and Ian’s brother) Andrew Brennan.  But that’s another story…

Wayne Dundon's appeal

Wayne Dundon was released on Friday morning, 19 March, after serving about 5 years of a 7 year sentence for threatening to kill Ryan Lee outside Brannigan’s Pub on Mulgrave Street on 19 December 2004. That night, a Sunday, Wayne Dundon and his wife, Anne Casey, were bringing Wayne’s 14 year old sister, Annabel, for a drink.  When Ryan Lee refused her entry, Dundon put an imaginary gun to his head and said “fuck you, you’re dead” before leaving.  Half an hour later, a man wearing a motorcycle helmet came into Brannigan’s  and shot Ryan Lee in the leg and in the groin. 

Wayne Dundon

 No one was arrested for that shooting, but Wayne Dundon was arrested and charged with threatening to kill Ryan Lee.  Dundon was tried in April 2005 and sentenced to the maximum 10 years on 13 May by Judge Carroll Moran in Limerick Circuit Court.  Dundon was also to serve a concurrent 3-year sentence for assaulting two Gardaí on 22 December 2004 in a Garda interview room as he was interrogated. He broke one detective’s jaw. Four days after sentencing, Dundon’s legal team filed an Application for Leave to Appeal against both the sentence and the conviction.

Dundon’s solicitor during the trial was Shaun Elder, a low-key, well respected solicitor, based on the Crescent in Limerick city centre.  For his appeal, however, Dundon looked beyond Limerick.  His new solicitor was to be Matt Higgins of Higgins, Hollywood, Deazley, based in Belfast. Dundon also splashed out on a higher profile barrister - London-based James Lewis Q.C., described as ‘one of Britain’s leading anti-terrorism lawyers’.

Certainly, Wayne chose more wisely than his brother Dessie who employed the services of the colourful Giovanni Di Stefano for his unsuccessful appeal in July 2007 against his conviction for murdering Kieran Keane. Di Stefano and his agents also represented dad, Kenneth Dundon at his London murder trial in 2006 

Dundon’s change of legal team meant a lengthy appeal process.  His original solicitor submitted a Notice of Ground to Appeal in August 2005, while the new legal team filed another submission in February 2007.  The Northern Irish/English legal team came in for some criticism from the judges in the appeal court, who suggested they didn’t seem ‘fully familiar with the relevant procedural rules or practices in this jurisdiction’ and didn’t seem to work well with Dundon’s previous legal team. 

Some of the grounds for appeal, while possibly sound legal argument, strike the non-legal mind as somewhat farcical. One ground for appeal included the suggestion that the State had not proved the threat against Ryan lee’s life was sufficiently serious. Another appeal ground was that Dundon’s immortal phrase, “fuck you, you are dead” “could not be reasonably construed as being a threat to kill” under the law.

Dundon’s legal team also suggested that the judge in his original trial should have told the jury that Ryan Lee had motive to lie in his testimony but that “this was a matter which could not be raised by defence counsel because of the danger that, if it were raised, it would seriously prejudice the defence.”  In other words, the defence suggested the Lee may have lied at the trial because he felt Dundon shot him later that night but the actually shooting couldn’t be mentioned at the trial lest it ‘prejudice’ Wayne Dundon.

The Court of Criminal Appeal rejected Wayne Dundon’s appeal against his conviction on 13 February, 2008. However, his appeal against the ‘severity’ of his sentence was more successful.  The defence drew contrasts between Dundon’s 10 year sentence and Noel Campion’s 3 year sentence for threatening to kill a prison officer.  Coincidentally, both sentences were handed down on the same day.  The comparisons with Noel Campion are a little rich, particularly when you take into account that Campion was a former member of Wayne Dundon’s gang and was eventually murdered by this gang in Thomondgate on 26 April 2007.

Dundon’s legal team also suggested that Judge Carroll Moran made a mistake in his original trial when sentencing by taking into account the ‘surrounding circumstance’ that Ryan Lee was later shot and is still under Garda protection.

The ruling from the appeal court was that the crime was “certainly meriting a sentence in the region of  8 years” but that this would be shortened to 7 because Dundon had “assisted, in some relatively small way, the trial and its management”.

One interesting point made by Dundon’s legal team was their insistence, that, Wayne Dundon, when released would “return to the United Kingdom where he was raised”.  This contrasts with the suggestion of some media that Dundon is heading to the continent, Mexico or just staying put in Limerick, though he won’t be going far without a passport (unless his brother, Ger, sorts him out).

On a knife's edge

Early Wednesday morning on 10 March last, Robert McNamara (35) of St. Patrick’s Park, Carrick-on-Shannon was arrested in Leitrim and brought to Limerick for questioning in Roxboro Garda station over the hijacking of a taxi on 8 March.  McNamara allegedly hired a cab from Carrick-on-Shannon, County Leitrim to Roscommon town, some 25 miles away.  Once there, McNamara reportedly asked to be brought to Limerick, some 95 miles further on.  Not surprisingly, the taxi driver, a man in his 40s from Drumshambo, refused.  At this point, McNamara allegedly produced a knife, threatening the driver.  Over 3 hours later, the pair arrived in Limerick City at 3:30 in the morning.  The hijacker fled the cab on the Bawnmore Road, but not before he allegedly stole the Leitrim taxi driver’s  mobile phone, car keys and €140 in cash.  A women reportedly picked McNamara up in her car shortly afterwards. 

McNamara has a long history of knife crimes. Just over a decade ago, on 16 December 1999, Robert McNamara, then aged 25 and living in Clarina Park, Ballinacurra Weston, stabbed Brian O’Connell, a 22-year old father of 2, in the heart, fatally injuring him.  McNamara and O’Connell, from Doon, County Limerick, had met earlier that day, a Thursday, for the first time, in a pub, where they played pool together and played music on the juke box.  Later they went to the house of O’Connell’s sister, Sineád, to borrow money for more drink.  At this point, McNamara took a steak knife from the sister’s kitchen. 

The two men then travelled to the People’s Park in Pery Square together, climbing over the railings at around 5pm to drink some cans of beer under a park shelter. According to McNamara, they discussed robbing a woman's handbag to get more drinking money. 

As they talked, McNamara said he became uncomfortable with O’Connell, especially when the Doon man asked about McNamara’s facial scars. McNamara said he suddenly felt threatened and stabbed O’Connell.  O’Connell staggered away, managing to climb over the railings of the People’s Park before collapsing at one of the war monuments in Pery Square.   O’Connell died from a single stab wound to the chest that pierced his heart.

The People's Park, Pery Square

After the fatal stabbing, McNamara went to his mother’s house and threw the knife into a neighbour’s garden before turning himself into the Guards at Roxboro Station shortly afterwards.  Previous to this killing, McNamara had 49 convictions. 

At his trial, it emerged that McNamara, who, like Brian O'Connell, was also a father of two, had suffered from sexual abuse when about 10 years old, from a male nurse.  His history of psychiatric problems were not helped by a drink and drugs problem.  Dr Brian McCaffrey, a consultant psychiatrist who testified at the trial stated that,  "If he got real, good counselling to get him to verbalise his feelings he could emerge as a decent young man." McNamara showed his various scars to the jury during the trial – both the scars he received in an assault and the one’s he had inflicted on himself.

On 23 October 2002, Robert McNamara was found not guilty of murder but guilty of manslaughter at the Central Criminal Court, after the jury deliberated over 2 days. In December 2002, Judge Henry Abbott sentenced Robert McNamara to 9 ½ years in jail at the Central Criminal Court.

Though McNamara was originally held on bail after his arrest in December 1999, it seems he was, at some stage, released before his trial in October 2002.  On 20 June 2002, he was arrested again, this time for possession of a kitchen knife on a Limerick street at 1:30 in the morning, and brought to Roxboro Garda Station.

McNamara’s handcuffs were released so he could sign some forms.  However, he became agitated after unsuccessfully trying to contact his mother and sister by phone at the Roxboro Garda station. McNamara then removed a second knife he had concealed in his underpants and threatened Gardaí. McNamara put his fist through a window in the station and actually stabbed himself in the stomach before fleeing the station. He gave himself up shortly afterwards near Roxboro Shopping Centre.  He was charged with 2 counts of possessing a knife, assaulting 6 Gardai and criminal damage. McNamara pleaded guilty to all charges and received two concurrent 6 month sentences. The Sun (12/07/02) ran with the headline, 'MAN ATTACKS COPS WITH KNIFE IN HIS UNDIES'.

McNamara also has an earlier conviction, dating back to 1996, for knife crime.  On 3 may 1996, McNamara attacked a man and a woman on Catherine Street with a handyman’s knife.  McNamara initially failed to turn up for his court hearing and a bench warrant was issued. After McNamara pleaded guilty in Limerick’s District Court, Judge Michael Reilly, now the Inspector of Prisons, jailed McNamara, then just 21 and living in O’Malley Park, Southill, to 33 months and directed that he should receive psychiatric treatment.

A shot at Coffey

Paul Coffey had a lucky escape on Sunday, 14 March last on Michael Street, when, at around 9:30pm, a gunman, probably with the McCarthy-Dundon gang, fired at least two shots at him before making his escape in a old Toyota Corolla.

The target of the shooting on Michael Street is originally from Derryfada, Clonlara and later of Craeval Park, Moyross. Paul Coffey was the driver for Kieran Keane and Philip Collopy (both now themselves dead) when they murdered Eddie Ryan in the Moose Bar on 12 November 2000.  This murder is regarded as sparking off the intense feud that has seen some 20 deaths in a decade.

That Sunday night back in 2000, Coffey was out driving with his partner Michelle Ryan, when Keane and Collopy asked him to drive them somewhere.  They took him to a coal yard where he got into a large dark car and drove the two to the Moose Bar on Cathedral Place. While en route, Keane made a quick mobile call to his spotter to confirm Eddie Ryan was in the bar.

The Moose Bar

Collopy and Keane entered the bar wearing balaclavas, shooting Eddie Ryan 11 times, also hitting a mother and daughter standing next to him.  Eddie Ryan was effectively a dead man walking after his gun jammed when he tried to kill Christy Keane just two days earlier. After the shooting in the Moose Bar, Coffey managed to stall the getaway car outside but eventually got it going and, after dropping of the two gunmen, doused the car in petrol and torched it out in Corbally. 

Less than a month later, on 10 December 2000, Coffey was arrested in connection with the Eddie Ryan murder.  His partner Michelle Ryan, a relation of Eddie's, originally told the Guards she wouldn’t cover for Coffey any more, but later refused to sign any statement incriminating him. 

Coffey’s first murder trial, in April 2002, had to be abandoned after firstly, a juror went missing and later, one of the main Garda witnesses was seriously ill and had to be hospitalised.  

Paul Coffey - his lawyer says he has low I.Q.

The subsequent murder trial, in July 2003, was halted when the charge of murder was withdrawn and Coffey agreed to plead guilty to manslaughter.  He was sentenced to 15 years, with 7 years of this suspended.  Judge Henry Abbott took into account the fact that Coffey, according to his Defence Counsel, had a low IQ and was by no means the mastermind of the operation.  Coffey himself insisted that he only realised what was actually going on when Keane and Collopy put their balaclavas on outside the Moose Bar.  The Judge also considered that Coffey suffered from depression, abused drugs and claimed had been sexually abused in his youth. 

Coffey’s prison sentence wasn’t entirely uneventful.  In 2006, he was involved in a serious fight with another Limerick gang member, the one-legged Roy Woodland.  Woodland slashed Coffey’s face with a blade from his ear to his mouth.  Woodland, like Coffey, would be a minion in the Keane-Collopy gang, so their disagreement was probably not feud-related, unless the Keane’s were still annoyed that Coffey had, initially at least, so readily named names to the Guards back in 2000.

More recently, in June 2008, Coffey was caught with a pink Sony Ericsson phone in his cell in Limerick Prison and, after a trial at the Limerick District Court, had three months added to his sentence.

Coffey’s release in January 2010 attracted plenty of publicity.  'Notorious gang killer released from prison' was the headline in the Irish Independent, while Fine Gael’s spokesman on Justice, Charlie Flanagan, lambasted the Government in a Dáil debate on gangland crime, highlighting Coffey’s case as a reason for a minimum mandatory 25 year sentence for murder. 

This wasn’t the first time Paul Coffey’s criminal record became a political football.  In June 1996, Coffey, then just 19, was on trial for driving a stolen car while drunk, uninsured and serving a driving ban. Judge Gerard Haughton, presiding at Limerick District Court, condemned then Justice Minister Nora Owen from the bench.  The judge asked, “Why should I bother sentencing criminals at all?”, if people like Paul Coffey were free on temporary release after just 5 weeks into a 10 month sentence for a similar offence.  Apparently, in this instance, Coffey was so drunk he barely recalled the incident.  Judge Haughton sentenced Coffey to 11 months and banned him from driving until 2011, meaning Coffey was driving while disqualified when he drove Kieran Keane and Philip Collopy to the Moose Bar in November 2000.

Nora Owen 'released' Paul Coffey in 1996

The Tobins

This Friday, Timmy Tobin was given a 14 year sentence for a horrific sex attack last August after he pleaded guilty.  The last 5 years were suspended.

In the early hours of Friday, the 14th of August 2009, Tobin noticed a man bothering a young foreign woman who was locked out of her house. The woman had argued with her boyfriend earlier and headed off home but had no house keys with her. Tobin told the guy that he was a McCarthy and that he should back off or else.  Tobin then walked with the woman around Westfields off the Condell Road.  After attempting to kiss her, the woman kissed Tobin on the cheek. Tobin later said he felt "let down and insulted" when she brushed off his advances.

Tobin then began a horrific attack that lasted over an hour. He punched the woman in the head, knocking her into undergrowth.  The woman offered him her possessions but Tobin laughed, telling her if he gave her oral sex he would leave her be.  Tobin pleaded guilty to four counts of rape and anal rape.  During the ordeal, Tobin made the woman wash herself in a stream in an attempt to destroy any forensic evidence of the sex attack.  

At one stage, when startled by a passer-by, Tobin began choking the woman. After raping the woman several times, choking her, threatening to kill her with a rock and making her again wash herself to destroy evidence of rape, Tobin broke down crying, asking her forgiveness, saying he was drunk and didn't know what he was doing. Tobin later told Gardai he had 8 cans of beer and some anti-depressants during that day.

The then-27-year-old Tobin went home, confessed to his girlfriend, and turned himself into Gardai next morning, but not before burning his clothes and destroying his mobile phone.

The victim had already gone to the Guards with her boyfriend at this stage and also travelled to Cork for examination by the Sexual Assault Treatment Unit in the South Infirmary Victoria University Hospital (Limerick only has "a part-time, partial sexual assault treatment service...which sees about 40 people a year"). 

At his initial hearing at the Limerick District Court, Judge Tom O’Donnell granted bail on the Tobin's own bond of €500 and an independent surety of €5,000.

Tobin, from Hogan Avenue, Kileely, was sentenced to 14 years, with fives years of that suspended, on Friday in the Central Criminal Court by Justice Barry White, the same judge who presided over the recent Eamon Lillis trial.

Judge Barry White

Timmy Tobin has six previous convictions.  One of those is for an attack, in 2003, on an 86-year old disabled woman.  In the early hours of Tuesday, the 15th of July 2003, Timmy Tobin, then just 21 years old, and another man broke in through the back door of the pensioner's house and threatened the 86-year old with a hammer in her bedroom.  After telling her they would shoot her if she didn't give them money, they eventually left with some €515 in cash.  In January 2004, Judge Carroll Moran, sitting in Limerick Circuit Court, jailed Timmy Tobin for seven years for the break-in but suspended the final three years because of Tobin's guilty plea.  Tobin's guilty plea followed some pretty irrefutable evidence left at the scene.  Timmy Tobin cut himself on glass as he left the elederly woman's house that night, leaving blood stains behind. Later he called an ambulance, telling paramedics and the Guards that he had just been stabbed on Thomond Bridge. 

Timmy isn't the only Tobin on Hogan Avenue, Kileely, fond of aggravated burglary.  By coincidence, Joseph Tobin, also of Hogan Avenue, assaulted and robbed a retired priest in his home back in 2007.  On Tuesday, the 6th of November 2007, Joseph Tobin and James Power, of Smith O'Brien Avenue, Kileely, broke in to a house through a conservatory window in Farranshone where Father Edward Kirby, a 72 year old retired priest lived.  Joseph Tobin hit the priest on the side of the head with a mallet, while Father Kirby was also hit with a sweeping brush handle and spat on.  The two ransacked the house causing €300 in damage, stole €315 in cash and and some rings belonging to the priest.

Father Kirby had been chaplain at Florida State Prison, where, among others, the serial-killer, Ted Bundy was executed and where, the priest said, "nothing ever happened to me and I was never under threat as I moved among men who had murdered, raped and robbed."  The priest returned to Limerick City in 1998 to retire. Since the attack, Father Kirby has had difficulty walking.

At his appearance in Limerick Circuit Court, in April 2008, Joseph Tobin, then 20 years old, was also charged with stealing cigarettes from a petrol station in Thomondgate, pleaded guilty to all charges.  He was judged the ringleader in the assault on the priest, and was given a 3 year sentence by Judge Carroll Moran, while Power later received a 2 year suspended sentence.

Tragedy in Shannon - 50 years ago today

The Irish Times ran a story today marking 50 years since the crash of an Alitalia flight near Shannon Airport as it flew Naples to New York Idlewind (now JFK) airport. The flight's only scheduled stop was in Rome to pick up more passengers.  It landed in Shannon only because strong headwinds made it necessary to pick up more fuel.  After a stopover of just over an hour, when the passengers shopping in the terminals while the plane took on 7,000 gallons of fuel, it took off again at 1:34a.m. early Friday morning in cold but clear weather. 

Original Irish Times graphic from 27/2/60

The four-engine propellered aircraft seemed to lose power about a mile from Shannon airport, banked heavily to the left and crashed through the walls of the old Clonloghan graveyard adjacent to the ruins of the 10th century Clonloghan church. The explosion was heard up to 17 miles away.  The plane continued to plough through the South-East of the graveyard, destroying tombstones, and into the field of grazing sheep beyond. One eye-witness described it as "a scene from hell". A local priest, Father Thomas Comerford, who arrived on the scene soon after the crash told reports, “There were bodies scattered all over the field.  People were mixed up with the remains of the sheep the plane had killed.”

At first count, out of the 40 passengers and 12 crew, there were 27 dead, 2 missing and 23 survivors.  Bodies were found up to a mile from the crash site on the mud flats of the Shannon. The eventual death toll would be 34 - the first ever passenger deaths for the Italian national airline.  Luckily though, the Douglas DC7 was only about half full.  Survivors were taken to Ennis County Hospital and to the Barringtons and Regional Hospitals in Limerick. 

Clonloghan church and graveyard - where the plane hit

Two Italian nurses were flown into Shannon to work in the local hospitals with the survivors as there were some language difficulties between medical staff and patients.  One initial survivor, a Capuchin Monk, Father Giuseppe Cacioli, had been given the last rights amongst the plane wreckage by the local priest, Father Thomas Comerford.  The monk survived almost another week before eventually dying from his injuries in the Regional Hospital.  Another victim was the heavily-pregnant wife of a 35 year old Yugoslav baker who was travelling to join him in America – they had recently married after escaping into Italy from communist Yugoslavia.

The Mayor of Limerick, Alderman John Carew T.D. sent telegram of condolence to Italian ambassador

The official crash investigation carried out by the Department of Transport and Power found no definitive cause of the crash.  No contact was received from the plane prior to crashing, and all seemed well with the flight until a few moments before the crash

10 months earlier, the same model of Douglas aircraft – a DC7C Douglas -  also flown by Alitalia, developed propeller problems over Atlantic.  One of its four propellers finally broke off mid-flight, though the plane managed to land safely in Shannon on 3 engines.

In these early decades of commercial air travel, accidents were more common and when Shannon was a major refuelling stop for transatlantic flights.

• 9 died in a TWA crash as it approached to land in Shannon in December 1946
• 30 died in a Pan-Am crash coming in to land in Shannon in April 1948
• 28 died when KLM Flight 633 crashed after take-off from Shannon in September 1954
• 84 died on a resident Airlines flight when it crashed into the River Shannon in September 1961

Back on the street

The latest copy of the Limerick Post (20/2/10) has a short clipping about a Limerick man arrested for public drunkenness back in January. Tony O’Brien (27) was arrested outside a Spar shop on Henry Street at 7:45am in January as he lay on the ground, too drunk to stand. In the District Court last week, Judge Tom O’Donnell heard the man had previous convictions, but nothing since early 2007. O’Brien was found guilty and fined €150.


This is the same Tony O’Brien, of Baker Place, arrested nearly four years ago after Keith Ryan (23) was found dead near the path that runs under Shannon Bridge on Thursday night, 25th May 2006, after being badly beaten just 2 days before his 24th birthday.


Keith Ryan, of Farranshone, had multiple head injuries. His nose had been fractured and his face and forehead and abdomen were stamped on. He eventually died after inhaling his own blood. It later emerged that the victim had blood alcohol levels of 260 mg at the time of his death – i.e. three times the legal limit for drivers and very drunk indeed. The State Pathologist, Marie Cassidy, said that Keith Ryan's level of intoxication could explain his lack of defensive injuries – he was simply too drunk to defend himself.


Tony O’Brien and Thomas Ryan, both then 23 years old, were arrested two days later in relation to the death. Originally both were charged with assault, but later charges of manslaughter were put to the two. Thomas Ryan pleaded guilty and was subsequently sentenced to 7 years. Tony O’Brien pleaded not guilty and was sent forward for trial.


During the 7-day manslaughter trial at Limerick’s Circuit Court, in early May 2007, details of that night began to emerge. The three friends had been drinking with others in Westfields for much of the day, and sheltered under Shannon Bridge when it started to rain. O‘Brien said the victim was “drunk and cheeky” that evening. The jury also heard that O’Brien and Keith Ryan had not been getting on and there had been an 'altercation' a few days earlier.


The fight broke out when O’Brien and his co-accused Thomas Ryan went to go to a house party in Pennywell without Kieth Ryan. He tried to follow and blows were exchanged. O’Brien admitted to hitting the victim just once but only after Ryan hit him. O’Brien said Ryan was ‘fine’ when they left him. The Defence suggested another group of youths may have inflicted more serious injuries.

The crime scene, May 2006

At Pennywell, a witnessed testified that she was asked to provide an alibi for the defendants and they had arranged for their shoes and socks to be cleaned.


After 3 hours deliberation, the jury returned a unanimous verdict. Tony O’Brien was found guilty and was later sentenced to 10 years by Judge Joseph Mangan. O’Brien had 42 previous convictions.


Keith Ryan’s mother shouted at the judge as the sentences were delivered, while Keith’s brother Thomas called for the ‘evil’ killers to be punished. Keith’s younger brother, Michael, cited his brother’s violent death for his own criminal acts when he was tried for a number of offenses including attempting to burgle a jewelers shop in the summer of 2007.


In late 2009, O’Brien’s case came before the Court of Criminal Appeal and on 2nd November last that court ruled that his conviction should be set aside and a retrial was ordered. The Limerick Post (7/11/09) noted that O’Brien would be remanded in custody until the retrial begins, though obviously O’Brien has been a free man for some time now

John Devane's Libel Case

John Devane has just lost a libel action in the High Court. The solicitor took a case against Garda Inspector Seamus Nolan, retired Chief Superintendent Gerard Mahon, the Garda Commissioner, the Attorney General, the Department of Justice, the Department of Finance and, eh, Ireland. These legal proceedings, begun way back in 2002, relate to events in 1996, whereby Devane alleges he was libelled by then-Sergeant Nolan.

John Devane

Apparently, the Guards received sexual abuse complaints from an intellectually-disabled youth against the Limerick solicitor relating to Devane’s appearance as Santa at a special needs school. Devane regards the episode as a ‘witch hunt’ against him that is related to a teacher he defended from abuse claims at the same school. He insists the Guards then made libellous comments to his then-partner, Allison Carty and his sister, Áine Cuddihy. The abuse allegations have no merit, and must’ve been particularly hurtful to Devane given his own abusive childhood.

Devane’s book, Nobody Heard Me Cry, published in September 2008, details a horrific succession of abuse from the age of 8 to his early teenage years in 1970s Limerick as a rent boy in public toilets on the Dock Road. He cites being on the receiving end of abuse from, among others, several Guards and priests, perhaps feeding into his present image as an anti-establishment figure.

Devane's 2008 book

Devane has represented some 125 institutional abuse victims, and was once accused of taking fees from victims who secured compensation from the Residential Institutions Redress Board despite the fact that the redress Board itself paid the legal costs incurred. Devane insisted fees were deducted from compensation because of the uncertainty that the Redress Board would pay solicitors. The fees were subsequently returned to clients.

Devane’s own complains of abuse were not prosecuted by the Director of Public Prosecutions. His complicated personal life is illustrated by the 2005 Civil Circuit Court case whereby Devane sought to have his sister removed from his house, while his mother sought a restraining order against the same sister after death threats.

Devane is no stranger to controversy. As some went in to legal practice to “take on the establishment”, his efforts seem to bring him in conflict with Judges, Gardaí and the Law Society. Judge Joseph Managan once fined him the sum of €1 after Devane called him a ‘clown’ in the Kildysart District Court, County Clare, in 2003. In fairness to Devane, he was preoccupied with trying to reschedule a court case so he could visit his partner in hospital that afternoon.

Because Devane represents so many disadvantaged clients, he is left open to occasional accusations of encouraging those clients to lie. In a 2002 murder trial, Devane was criticised by some for advising his client to reply to Garda questions with “I can’t remember, but if I do, I’ll tell you.” After a 2008 trial for drunken driving, defendant Fiona Porter was quoted as saying “I am not taking the blame for John Devane. He lied in the court and now he's trying to make f**king money off me”. This followed an unusual defence whereby Porter alleged she drove under the influence only after catching her husband in bed with her mother, despite the subsequent revelation that her husband was behind bars at the time.

More recently, in August 2009, allegations were aired that Devane was being investigated for passing inappropriate information to a client. The client was Noel Campion and the text message Devane sent him was reportedly discovered after Campion was murdered in April 2007. Devane was subsequently cleared by the Law Society. Another ruling by the Law Society was not so welcome by Devane, in July 2008, when he was fined €15,000 after a disciplinary hearing for the relatively forgivable offence of late serving of legal documents.

More serious was the raid by the Criminal Assets Bureau (CAB) on John Devane’s offices in February 2006 on Quinlan Street. At the time Devane suggested CAB targeted him because of his success at getting clients off but Gardai insisted it was part of a larger ongoing investigation.

Devane is quite litigious, even for a solicitor. Back in 1996, around the time he qualified as a solicitor, he took a case against AIB to the Circuit Civil Court. Devane had claimed he had been embarrassed in front of his partner’s parents on holiday in Asia when his credit card was declined. His court action failed after it emerged he had already accepted a £1,000 payment of ‘goodwill’ from the bank.

In 2006, after Devane contracted the MRSA bug, he invited the Limerick leader to his bedside in St. John's hospital. Devane, in a subsequent interview, threatened to have St. John’s hospital shut down, alleging his sickness cost him €500,000 in lost earnings.

The Limerick solicitor's list of class action and multiple client lawsuits range from the respected Residential Institutions Redress Board for abuse survivors (125 clients), and Army deafness cases (450 claims) as well as an MRSA 'superbug' suit (60 clients) to the more questionable mass lawsuit for prisoners who 'slop-out' (900 clients). Rather oddly, Devane also threatened legal action in 2001, when the Government announced plans to ban opinion polls for 7 days before an election.

Slopping out - are prisoners sick of this shit?

His work in favour of pre-election opinion polls was not Devane’s only foray into the world of politics. Though it was rumoured he was to be a Fianna Fáil local election candidate in 2001, it was in the 2007 General Election when Devane finally took the plunge, but as an Independent. His efforts to get elected to the 30th Dáil were unsuccessful though, and he received 330 first preference votes – about 0.67% of the electorate.

The highlight of his campaign was his attempt to confront Bertie Ahern with a plastic sword at the Jetland Shopping Centre on the Ennis Road, but a female Garda disarmed the solicitor prior to Bertie’s arrival. Devane told Guards, “I feel like Excalibur without my sword” as he made attempts to retrieve it.

Some years earlier, Devane had another brush with Bertie as he, somewhat comically, tried to serve a summons on Bertie on behalf of anti-war Shannon protesters.

Devane wasn’t always so antagonistic to Fianna Fáil politicians. In 1998, Dermot Ahern, then the Minister for Social, Community and Family Affairs, relaunched the Back to Education programme. John Devane was there at the launch, with the Minister, as model of the success of our adult education system.

Long time Late Late Show watchers may also remember his appearance on show in September 2004, with fellow guest Alan Titchmarsh.

Does he remember John Devane?

Devane is undoubtedly a hard worker, primarily as a Legal Aid defence solicitor. In 2009, he earned €433,603 from the State for his Legal Aid work, placing him only 15th on the list of top earning Legal Aid solicitors. Devane estimates that 80% of his income is from Legal Aid work, giving him a healthy income of €540,000 last year.

Devane’s clients have included members of most of the families involved in Limerick’s various feuds. He has been quite close to the Kelly family in Southill, even driving Mikey Kelly home from hospital after a 2002 shooting, and remarking that Mikey Kelly, a self-confessed wife-beater, had “done a lot of good work as a public representative” and had “changed the face of politics and is a force to be reckoned with.”

In March 2006, when he represented Anthony Kelly in his attempts to have his disability payments restored, Kelly claimed Devane had even paid for most of Kelly’s holiday in Lanzarote. Devane usually acts in the role of defence solicitor but acted as a private prosecutor in 2002 when Majella Kelly, the late Alderman Mikey Kelly’s wife, complained she was sexual assaulted by Detective Inspector Jim Browne in August 2001. The private prosecution failed and Mrs. Kelly was left to pay €70,000 in costs.

Devane’s closeness to the feuding partners in Limerick led to his offer to mediate between the gangs, suggesting that, as he has “a foot in each camp”, he was ideally suited to the role. It could be argued, however, that the demand for Devane’s mediation was fuelled by the successes of the Criminal Asset Bureau against the crime gangs in Limerick.

The downside of this closeness was highlighted in August 2009, when Devane was allegedly assaulted by a senior member of the Dundon family. Despite the fact that there were reportedly about 20 Gardai in and around the District Court that day, Devane was apparently grabbed by the throat and thrown to the ground.

According to Paul Williams (Sunday World, 6 January 2010) this was not the first time Devane has been attacked. In 2003, Kieran Keane reportedly beat Devane up at his home after getting the impression that Devane bungled a bail hearing for Kieran’s brother, Christy. Though he called the Gardai, Devane refused to make a formal complaint. Similarly, after this latest attack, Devane again refused to make a complaint, despite a plea from Stephen Collins, insisting he would be ‘a dead man walking’ if he filed a complaint with the Guards.

While Devane’s fears are understandable, it is difficult to reconcile his description of himself as a “working-class solicitor”, “defending people who have acted, possibly, out of sheer desperation, out of fear and poverty, people whose lives are often a complete mess and who are completely alienated from mainstream society” with the solicitor who, for over a decade now, has gone well beyond mere legal representation to many of Limerick’s most vicious criminals.