Babia Saulite, the victim of Dublin's latest gun murder, had been in the news before, writes Conor Lally.
The fatal burst of gunfire that shattered the suburban peace on a Swords housing estate on Sunday night marked the end of a difficult life in Ireland for immigrant Babia Saulite.
The 28-year-old Latvian mother of two had settled in Dublin with her Lebanese partner Hassan Hassan while in her early 20s but their dream of a prosperous life in a booming economy was to turn into the stuff of nightmares.
The couple lived in Lucan at first and had two children in Ireland before separating acrimoniously. Hassan then became involved in organised crime and has ended up in jail here. Now his estranged wife is dead and the couple's two boys - Rami, aged three, and Ali, aged five - are being placed in foster care by the State because there is nobody here to look after them.
The difficult nature of the couple's relationship was revealed in the national media in January of last year. Ms Saulite went on Joe Duffy's Liveline programme to appeal to members of the public to tell gardaí if they spotted her two boys.
They had been taken by their father by arrangement on December 6th, 2004. He was to return them to her three days later but failed to do so. He told his estranged partner that the children were in the UK staying with relatives of his.
The children were eventually returned to Ms Saulite but not before she was forced to take Hassan to court. He spent Christmas 2004 in jail after refusing to obey initial court orders to return the two children to their mother.
It wasn't the 35-year-old's only encounter with Irish justice.
In February 2004 he had appeared before the District Court in Kildare. He was charged in relation to his role in an organised Middle Eastern crime gang that had been stealing luxury cars to order in Dublin and surrounding counties and exporting them to Eastern Europe for spare parts.
He was one of four people arrested in February 2004 at a warehouse near Kilcullen, Co Kildare. Gardaí raided it as part of an investigation into an organised ring that had been robbing luxury cars for at least eight months.
Gardaí believe the vehicles were being stolen to order by Irish criminals, who were paid €2,000-€10,000 per vehicle by Hassan and his Lebanese and Syrian co-accused.
Luxury vehicles such as BMWs and Mercedes and worth several million euro are understood to have passed through the hands of gang members before they were caught.
When gardaí raided the Kilcullen premises they recovered a number of partially disassembled cars, car parts and a large shipping container packed with parts worth an estimated €250,000, ready to be taken to Dublin docks. Hassan was convicted for his role in the scam and is serving a four-year jail term.
Those criminals who sourced the cars for Hassan would break into a house, take the car keys and then drive away in the vehicle parked outside. Hassan is due for release in 2009.