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.