SHOOTING victim Brian O’Reilly’s pal Derek McLoughlin kept a vigil outside Dublin hospital on Friday as he awaited news on the criminal’s condition.
O’Reilly (45), was shot in the chest and arm as he sat in a car outside Platinum Gym in Balbriggan, Co. Dublin, shortly after 11am on Friday.
A lone gunman armed with a 9mm pistol fled the scene in what is believed to be a white Nissan 200 SX or white Toyota Supra. He was not wearing a mask and was described as having dark hair. The scene of the shooting was just yards from a crèche.
O’Reilly, who was a close associate of Eamon ‘the Don’ Dunne, was injured, but will survive the attack. He survived another gun attack in Bettystown, Co. Meath, four years ago when a Real IRA hitman targeted him in his local pub.
McLoughlin, who has himself survived an assassination attempt, arrived to the scene of Friday’s shooting after hearing what had happened. He lives around the corner from the scene of the attempted hit. He also followed his pal to Beaumont Hospital.
O’Reilly was sitting up and talking when he arrived in hospital.
Our exclusive picture shows McLoughlin waiting outside the hospital.
Gardai are probing a number of theories as to the motive of the shooting.
O’Reilly had been involved in a row with a gang based in Dublin’s north inner city over a cash dispute. The gang are based in the Sheriff Street area of Dublin and is centred around a family.
There had also been tensions between associates of O’Reilly and members of a Coolock drugs gang over drugs which went missing. The same gang were behind a shooting incident in Donaghmede two weeks ago.
A gunman fired a shot at the house on St Donagh’s Road. The shooting was intended to intimidate a man who was not in the house at the time. It is understood the gang knew the man was not in the house, but his mother was present at the time.
It is believed they were trying to exert pressure on the man to pay them protection money.
“This gang are causing a fair bit of trouble and are throwing their weight around,” said a source.
The same gang were also blamed for stealing a shipment of cannabis herb in Co. Meath in April. The drugs were believed to belong to associates of O’Reilly.
“This gang may have thought they would be targeted by O’Reilly’s associates over this so they struck first,” said a source.
A third theory is that a criminal gang from O’Reilly’s home area of Ballymun on the city’s northside were involved.
While not ruling it out, gardai do not at this stage suspect that the Real IRA were behind the shooting.
O’Reilly had been living in the Bettystown area for a number of years, but is understood to have moved to Balbriggan recently.
It is understood he was aware of threats to his life.
McLoughlin and O’Reilly are close associates. Both men carried the coffin at gang boss Eamon ‘the Don’ Dunne’s funeral in April 2010.
Four months after his buddy was murdered, O’Reilly himself was the target of hitmen and was shot twice in a pub near his home. O’Reilly was enjoying a pint in
McDonough’s pub in Bettystown when two gunmen singled him out.
Eight shots were fired, but he was lucky and only suffered bullet wounds to the chin and arm.
It is believed that the Real IRA, headed by Alan Ryan, organised for O’Reilly to be shot because he refused to pay them protection money.
Months after the killing he went to the High Court to claim senior gardai are in collusion with crime reporters to set him up to be murdered.
O’Reilly, in an affidavit, said that since Dunne had been shot, he had become the target of considerable media speculation that he had taken control of the drugs and crime organisation left vacant by Dunne’s death. He was unsuccessful in the case.
McLoughlin, like O’Reilly, survived a hit attempt while he was sitting in a car outside a gym in May last year.
He was in a car park at the Castle Shopping Centre in Swords when a gunman walked up to him, but the hitman’s gun jammed.
McLoughlin, who was hit with a €600,000 CAB bill in 2010, was one of six people convicted over a violent assault on a man at Ballymun Tower Centre the same year. He was given a suspended four-year sentence.
