A NUMBER of criminals at the centre of a Garda raid targeting crime gangs and dissident republicans in Dublin last week have been granted licences to work in the security industry.
At least two of the men have kept their licences despite being key members of a Real IRA gang suspected of heavy involvement in gun crime.
Gardaí investigating the Dublin faction of the Real IRA believe the criminals are using the licences to win contracts supplying doormen to pubs and clubs in the city.
Once those contracts have been secured, they have been extorting money from drug dealers they find dealing in the pubs.
Detectives are also investigating whether the Real IRA faction has threatened a number of publicans with violence unless they close their premises and stop taking customers from the pubs where the faction is working the doors.
Two men and a woman arrested last Friday when more than 100 gardaí raided business and residential addresses across north Dublin were released without charge.
The raids took place in the north inner city and the suburbs of Donaghmede, Artane and Beaumont. Rounds of ammunition for a handgun and cocaine valued at €500 were found at one address.
One of those arrested on Friday is a businessman and close associate of some of the Real IRA figures who, while not arrested last week, were the main targets of Friday’s operation.
Three men in their 30s from Dublin who have served prison sentences for serious gun crime form the nucleus of the Real IRA faction under investigation.
Despite having serious criminal records, they have been granted licences to work in the security industry. The men have not lost these licences despite a significant escalation in their criminal activities over the last 18 months.
They have secured contracts with several licenced premises in Dublin and have been involved in efforts to extort money from some of the city’s main drugs gangs.
The dissidents have extorted hundreds of thousands of euro from some drug dealers who have been threatened with shooting if they did not pay.
Efforts to extort cash from other gangs have resulted in the Real IRA faction becoming involved in a gun feud with some of Dublin’s biggest and most violent drugs gangs.
The faction is embroiled in a feud with the major drug and armed robbery gang in Finglas once led by Martin “Marlo” Hyland, who was shot dead in 2006, and then led by Eamon Dunne (34), who was shot dead in a pub in Cabra last April.
The man regarded as the current leader of the Finglas gang survived a gun attack last year. The Real IRA faction members are the chief suspects for that attack.
A number of gangs have now come together to form an alliance to fight the extortion demands of the Real IRA faction.
The shooting and wounding of three men outside a licenced premises in Dublin last year was linked to the feud between the Finglas crime gang and the Real IRA faction, though none of the men wounded is involved in crime.
Last year, the Real IRA faction attempted to shoot a drug dealer in a north Dublin suburb but the gunman’s weapon jammed.
The Real IRA are also prime suspects for the shooting dead of drug dealer Seán Winters (41) in Portmarnock, Dublin, last September.
Dublin criminal Daniel Gaynor (25), who was shot dead in Finglas last year, was a paid killer who carried out a number of shootings on behalf of the Real IRA faction. He was killed by the Finglas gang as part of the feud with the faction.