Although so much has been written about Christy Kinahan snr for two decades now, few people in Ireland have ever heard his voice. Recent recordings of the global cartel founder heard by The Irish Times make for fascinating listening.
There is only a hint of an Irish twang. Instead, Kinahan’s accent is decidedly clipped British, with a mix of other influences. Far from the traditional working-class Dublin accent that might be expected, he sounds like a middle-class businessman from the English “home counties” who has spent so much time living abroad his accent has begun to morph.
Reviewing samples of him speaking was a sharp reminder of who Kinahan (67) is; a chameleon “citizen of the world” about whom little is known. Until late 2022, when The Irish Times revealed previously unknown aspects of his life, nobody was aware that he had a young family with his long-term partner, a Dutch citizen, and had tried unsuccessfully to secure residency in Zimbabwe.
Though he has been prominent in the media for more than two decades, and flooded Irish streets with drugs, he has always managed to remain several steps ahead of law enforcement. And while reporters have chronicled his criminal rise in great detail, much has been missed. There was a period of years when even his whereabouts in the world were unknown.
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That has been his talent – if you could call it that – for the last quarter century; always elusive and slippery.
But his world – and that of his sons Daniel (47) and Christopher jnr (44) – is changing, even if they remain at liberty in their Dubai bolt-hole. The State this week signed an extradition treaty with the United Arab Emirates (UAE), of which Dubai is the biggest city and one of the seven emirates that constitute the UAE. And as the signature of Minister for Justice Helen McEntee on that agreement was still drying, the men who ran the Kinahans’ operations in Britain and Ireland – Thomas ‘Bomber’ Kavanagh and Liam Byrne – were jailed at the Old Bailey.
Daniel Kinahan’s right-hand man, Dubliner Sean McGovern (38), was arrested in Dubai less than a fortnight previously. He was taken into custody on foot of an extradition request from Ireland, becoming the first Kinahan cartel figure to be detained in the UAE.
With those rapid-fire developments, we may be finally entering the endgame for the Kinahans. If the trio’s time is now really running out, which one of them is most likely to be caught? Or is it simply a case of the men just below them in the pecking order being swallowed up while the father and sons slip the net?
As moves were being made in Ireland, UAE and the UK against the Kinahan cartel, its nemesis Gerry Hutch has been experiencing his own problems. The 61-year-old was arrested in Lanzarote, his second home, on Wednesday as part of a major investigation into alleged money laundering there by the Hutch gang.
He now finds himself facing criminal charges, and he appeared before a court in Lanzarote on Friday along with other suspects. It is alleged money generated by the Hutch gang in Dublin has been laundered through businesses and other assets, such as property investments, in Lanzarote.
The investigation, by the Guardia Civil, has been under way for several years, with a number of searches taking place in 2022 and at least 11 more occurring on Wednesday. Though 10 of those searches took place in Spain, Hutch’s home in Clontarf, north Dublin, was also searched by the Garda, after a request for assistance from the Spanish police.
In 2019, in evidence by the Criminal Assets Bureau (Cab) to the High Court – in a case against gang leader Liam Byrne – Hutch was identified as leading what the bureau described as “the Hutch organised crime group” in Dublin. In the same evidence, he was named as a key protagonist on one side of the Kinahan-Hutch feud, with Byrne, Daniel Kinahan and Freddie Thompson on the opposing side.
Hutch has been linked to multimillion armed robberies in the 1980s and 90s. He previously settled with Cab after a judgment of almost £2 million.
He was arrested in Spain in 2021 to be extradited to the Republic to face a charge of murdering David Byrne (34) at the Regency Hotel attack in Dublin in 2016. However, he was acquitted by the Special Criminal Court last year and since then has divided his time between Dublin and Lanzarote.
He found himself in custody again this week, and facing a prison sentence if convicted. Garda sources said there were also ongoing criminal investigations into his gang in Ireland, which would continue if he is jailed in Spain.
Just days before his arrest, Hutch’s associates had floated the idea of him running in the upcoming general election. It was suggested he would put his name on the ballot paper, for the Dublin Central constituency, where Sinn Féin president Mary Lou McDonald is a TD.
The theory - floated in the media rather than confirmed - is that he planned to run to take votes away from McDonald in a bid to damage Sinn Féin. Its former inner city councillor Jonathan Dowdall gave evidence against Hutch during the Special Criminal Court trial last year.
If he goes on trial in Lanzarote, that process should shed new light on the extent of the Hutch gang’s wealth, something that has been closely guarded, and Hutch may be taken out of circulation for several years.
Kavanagh and Byrne
In the latest development for the Kinahan cartel, Dubliners Thomas “Bomber” Kavanagh (57) and his brother-in-law Liam Byrne (43), were jailed for six and five years respectively at the Old Bailey on Tuesday for a firearms conspiracy. But gardaí believe this will have minimal, if any, impact on the Kinahans, who are now players on a global scale and for whom Ireland, and even Britain, are not essential drugs markets.
Kavanagh was already serving 21 years for trafficking more than £30 million-worth of the Kinahans’ drugs into Britain, on top of an original three-year sentence for possessing a stun gun in his home in England in 2019. When his concurrent sentences are combined, and 50 per cent remission in Britain is factored in, he still has about 10 years to serve. He will be 67 on release.
[ Kinahan leader ‘gave names’ to UK police over guns stashOpens in new window ]
Byrne, who ran the Kinahans’ Irish operation, is a different proposition. With remission and time already served factored into his sentence, he will be free in about a year, just after his 45th birthday. He has time to start again. However, his gang in Dublin – which distributed the Kinahans’ drugs throughout Ireland – was wiped out by the Garda investigation into the Kinahan-Hutch feud. About 70 of its members, associates and freelancers were jailed.
Gardaí pointed out that Byrne left the Republic for Britain, and then Dubai, “seven or eight years ago”, while Kavanagh has already been in prison in the UK for the past five years.
“I’d say the fact they’re out of circulation has already been priced in [by the Kinahans]. It’s not going to have much impact now,” said one Garda source. He added that the Kinahans controlled so much of the cocaine moving around Europe that they still stood to earn from the drug’s consumption in Britain and Ireland.
Another source agreed, saying that the Kinahans’ “not having a crew to directly handle drugs for them” in Britain and Ireland represented a “change in business model, rather than the end of the world” for them. But he also believed the jailing of Byrne – the gang leader’s first prison sentence in more than 20 years – was very significant. It completed the toppling of his gang in Dublin, which was the biggest player in domestic drug dealing for almost two decades.
McGovern arrest and extradition treaty
The signing of the extradition treaty between the State and the UAE is regarded by the Garda and the Government as a major breakthrough. It means any senior criminal figure wanted in the State can be arrested in Dubai and sent back to Ireland for trial. Senior gardaí are hopeful the arrangement will dissuade leading Irish gangland figures from fleeing there to direct drug trafficking and money laundering. Since moving to Dubai, for example, the Kinahans have become leading members of a European “super cartel”, which Europol says controls about a third of the cocaine coming into Europe.
[ Newly leaked documents reveal extent of Kinahan group’s Dubai property networkOpens in new window ]
Garda sources stressed that not all extraditions sought by western countries from Dubai went smoothly, with some unexpectedly refused even after extradition treaties were put in place. They said it would be crucial that the first requests from the Irish authorities were prepared and executed to perfection from the Irish side.
“They’ll send our people back to us if it’s in their interests,” said one source. “And until now what’s been in their interests is allowing criminals into Dubai with criminal money and allowing them launder that money. You are dealing with very powerful people in UAE; they are unpredictable and they can do what they want, frankly.”
Other sources said the authorities in Dubai knew all about the history of the Kinahan cartel from the time Christy Kinahan snr arrived there almost a decade ago, closely followed by his sons. Yet, life has not been made difficult for them in the UAE – quite the opposite, it seems.
Dubai has been attractive to top-tier criminals – the few with the resources to go on the run and create a new life – precisely because of the lack of extradition arrangements with the State, until now. It is also a global financial centre. It offers all the banking and business structures drugs wholesalers need to move and launder money, with few questions apparently asked by UAE authorities about where the cash has come from.
When interviewed by The Irish Times in Dubai in March, Garda Commissioner Drew Harris said the benefits Dubai offered to drug traffickers were not readily available elsewhere, which was why he believed the Kinahans had not relocated.
“This is a place of legitimate business and money flow but the other places that have been mentioned [such as Iran], maybe not so much. There is not, in effect, a second Dubai for them to go to,” Harris said.
The arrest of McGovern is seen as very significant in Garda circles. It is the first concrete proof the Dubai authorities are willing to move against the Kinahan cartel.
McGovern, a 38-year-old Dubliner, has been Daniel Kinahan’s right-hand man in Dubai. He is a key figure at the apex of the cartel and is now wanted in Ireland to face criminal charges – for the Kinahan-Hutch feud murder of Noel Kirwan (62) in Dublin in 2016 and for directing organised crime.
The combination of McGovern’s arrest and the extradition treaty being signed – especially coming in such close proximity – represents a big change for the Kinahans.
You have McGovern lifted in Dubai and Kinahan has lost that massive boxing business because of the US sanctions. That all chips away at them, at the aura and the power. Someone might just make a break for it, give information and take the money in America
— Garda source
“The Kinahans will be thinking they are next, especially Daniel; that he’s going to get a knock on the door,” said one source. “Certainly, if I was him, I’d be thinking that.”
However, the Kinahans’ extradition cannot be requested unless and until the DPP directs that they face serious criminal charges in the Republic. Suspects can only be extradited to a country to go on trial on charges already approved, with a prosecution process ready to commence. While a Garda inquiry into the Kinahans was completed last year, and a file sent to the DPP, a decision on criminal charges is still awaited.
Which Kinahan is most likely to be caught?
Garda sources said of the three, Daniel Kinahan is most at risk of being charged in Ireland, perhaps for directing organised crime. Christy Kinahan snr has long surrendered the day-to-day running of the Kinahan cartel to his sons.
“Daniel Kinahan and Christopher jnr now manage his drug-trafficking operations, while Christopher snr oversees the property portions of the enterprise,” the US Department of the Treasury has said. The prospect of bringing charges against Kinahan snr, in Ireland, seems more remote because of the step back he has taken.
Furthermore, while Christopher jnr is a key target, his brother appears to have had most frequent contact with the men who ran the cartel’s Irish operation. That included the period of the Kinahan-Hutch feud up to 2018; contact and involvement that exposes Daniel Kinahan to more significant risk of now being tripped up by criminal charges relating to that time.
For example, the Irish courts have already heard he is suspected of having been the gunman when Patrick Hutch was shot in the leg in Dublin in 2015. A nephew of Gerry Hutch, Patrick Hutch was shot in a punishment attack after he was accused of being involved in a plot to kill Daniel Kinahan in Spain earlier that year.
There also remains a $5 million reward from US law enforcement for information leading to the arrest and conviction of any of the three Kinahans. Those rewards have been in place since April 2022, when the US Department of the Treasury also imposed financial and travel sanctions on the Kinahans and four of their associates, including McGovern.
The sanctions resulted in Daniel Kinahan being forced out of his position as a dealmaker at the top of professional boxing globally, a major blow for his efforts to launder money and also assume the persona of a legitimate businessman.
Though the rewards remain uncollected two-and-a-half years after being offered, gardaí are still optimistic.
“You have McGovern lifted in Dubai and Kinahan has lost that massive boxing business because of the US sanctions,” pointed out one Garda source. “That all chips away at them, at the aura and the power. And someone might just make a break for it, give information and take the money in America.”
Michael O’Sullivan, the former Garda assistant commissioner who was once also head of the Garda National Drugs Unit, said the new extradition agreement must now be tested. And the success or otherwise of the first cases would be crucial for its long-term effectiveness and in setting the tone of UAE-Ireland criminal justice co-operation going forward.
“But now the sense of Dubai being a safe haven for Irish criminals is in tatters,” O’Sullivan said of the extradition treaty snatching away a safety net. “At least there’s a process now where Ireland can seek the return of these people. And now it’s a case of waiting to see how the first cases go, the first two or three extraditions we look for.”
O’Sullivan said that while the Garda investigations into the Kinahan cartel figures in Ireland had been very successful, when it came to trying to catch the three Kinahans, the US joining the pursuit back in 2022 was crucial.
“The fact the Americans have placed rewards on the Kinahans is hugely significant. Because of the rewards, the Kinahans are no longer ‘just some Irish criminals’ that Ireland is pursuing. And the rewards and sanctions effectively placed huge restrictions on the Kinahans; look how the boxing companies in the US were all banned from dealing with [Daniel] Kinahan.”
O’Sullivan, who headed the EU anti-drugs-trafficking agency MAOC-Narcotics after his Garda career, said the rewards effectively moved the Kinahans to the top of the list of Dubai-based European criminals sought for extradition.
“There are plenty of countries who want to extradite suspects from Dubai back to their own countries – a lot. But there’s not too many with US rewards hanging over them. The US is a very powerful entity, and that’s now a large global pressure on the UAE in this case. Once the Americans are in the ring, to use a boxing expression, these are formidable opponents.”
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