Dublin man jailed for role in David Douglas murder

A man who drove one of the four cars used in the murder of David Douglas has been jailed for six years by the Special Criminal Court.

Presiding judge Mr Justice Tony Hunt said that while Nathan Foley was not the main instigator in the planning of this "execution-style" murder, he had performed a significant role.

This was “an intrinsically planned and pre-meditated murder” which involved a significant number of other personalities apart from the gunman, remarked the judge.

The “most heinous” aspect was the fact that Mr Douglas was discovered by his daughter within seconds of being shot, the non-jury court found.

The three-judge court previously heard that Foley was a “runner” and a “foot-soldier” for the criminal organisation and was friendly with the son of one of the main organisers.

He also scouted around the area before the murder; put a petrol can into the getaway car which was burned out after the murder and bought two phones which were later found in that car.

Foley also dropped the gunman and another man already convicted of Mr Douglas’s murder at a restaurant in Dublin city centre that night and later joined them there.

Mr Douglas (55) was shot six times as he took a meal break at the counter in his partner’s shop, Shoestown, on Bridgefoot Street in the south inner city on the afternoon of July 1st, 2016.

Foley (20), with an address at Rosary Road, Maryland, Dublin 8, admitted in November to participating in or contributing to activity intending to facilitate the commission by a criminal organisation or any of its members of a serious offence, namely the murder of David Douglas at Bridgefoot Street in Dublin 8 between July 1st and July 4th, 2016.

The offence is contrary to organised crime legislation brought in by Section 72 of the Criminal Justice Act 2006.

‘Gillie’

Before the sentence hearing, defence counsel Paul Greene SC, for Foley, said his client had asked him to express his regret in relation to Mr Douglas’ death.

Passing sentence, Mr Justice Hunt said he accepted that Foley was not involved in issues of strategy or planning but he had acted as a “gillie” or a “runner” for the main organiser of the killing.

Mr Justice Hunt said this “main organiser” had already been dealt with by the Special Criminal Court.

The judge said the headline sentence in the case was nine years imprisonment.

Mitigating factors in sentencing, Mr Justice Hunt said, were his limited cognitive abilities, his timely guilty plea, young age and remorse. Foley has 32 previous convictions.

The judge accepted Foley had vulnerabilities and was compromised in various areas of reasoning which had been divulged to the court previously by expert evidence. There was a “lack of shrewdness” on Foley’s part demonstrated by basic errors of tasks entrusted to him by the main organiser and he was not well-equipped to assist in the commission of serious crime, remarked the judge.

Mr Justice Hunt, sitting with Judge Sinead Ni Chualachain and Judge Cormac Dunne, sentenced Foley to six years imprisonment, backdated to December 15th, 2017.

Frederick “Freddie” Thompson (37), with an address at Loreto Road, Maryland, Dublin 8 was found guilty of Mr Douglas’s murder in August of last year and sentenced to the mandatory term of life imprisonment by the Special Criminal Court.