UK HITMAN LINKED TO ALAN RYAN GUN DEATH Garda are told the assassin was hired by north Dublin drugs gang
ASSASSINATED: RIRA boss Alan Ryan was shot dead
GARDAI are working on the theory that a hitman travelled from England to murder Real IRA gang leader Alan Ryan. Investigators have CCTV footage of a man who travelled to Belfast and got on a flight to Manchester following the cold-blooded killing in September last year.
Gardai received intelligence that the man captured on CCTV was hired by a north Dublin drugs gang to carry out Ryan's murder. Detectives arrested a 26-year-old man from Coolock during the week in relation to the killing. He had just been released from prison where he was serving a short sentence for road traffic offences when gardai arrested him. He was previously pepper sprayed by gardai in a driving incident in Coolock in October 2011.
At the time he was with Jonathan Gill (31), from Malahide Road in Dublin, who this week was named as a leader of an organised crime gang in Dublin. The 26-year-old arrested this week, who has convic-tions for drug dealing, is the fifth person to be arrested in relation to the killing. The arrest comes after Gill and his associate Paschal Kelly (47) - originally from Coolock - were arrested in Enniskillen, Co Fermanagh, earlier this month and charged with possession of criminal property.
Cash
They were told by a judge in the North that they would not get bail after PSNI officers outlined in court how the two men were a flight risk and had access to large quantities of cash. The joint PSNI/Garda operation recovered sums of €65,826 and £2,669 (stg) in cash along with 24 mobile phones.
They also found a passport which had a photograph of Kelly but had the name Brendan Duffy which was the name Kelly gave police when he was stopped. The court heard the apartment the men were staying in had been rented by Anthony Heaney who in a witness statement told officers he had sublet it to Kelly.
Explaining how he believed the men were a flight risk, a PSNI officer said: "We believe these people are leaders of a criminal gang." The court also heard of an active threat to Kelly's life. Judge Gerard Trainor described Kelly as a "seasoned, practised criminal" with convictions for robbery and escaping lawful custody.
DENIED BAIL: Jonathan Gill
The men were refused bail and remanded in custody to appear again at Fermanagh Court by video link from Maghaberry Prison on March 11. It is understood both Kelly and Gill are under threat from dissident republicans. Many of Ryan's former associates have been booted out of the dissident group since his killing. Belfast man Fat Deccy Smith, who was a close pal of Ryan, was shot in the leg by the terror group in Dublin in January.
The dissident organisation, who are calling themselves the IRA since a merger with other republican groups, booted Smith out after accusing him of keeping extortion money that should have been sent up the North.
Punishment
Another associate, Nathan Kinsella, was shot in the knee by the group in November last year. Both punishment attacks were carried out as part of what was described as "in-house cleaning" of the Dublin branch of the IRA. Several other key Ryan associates have been kicked out as part of the restructuring process.
Reports this week suggested three men have now been appointed to direct operations in the capital. The middle-aged men live in Finglas, Coolock and Tallaght. Meanwhile, locals in Sligo say former associates of Ryan have been making extortion demands in the county. Gardai stopped four men, including two brothers from Dublin, were arrested in Castlebaldwin last month and found balaclavas in their car.
The arrest happened shortly after four masked men called to the family home of a man demanding €40,000. The men arrested had links to Sligo man Aaron Nealis, a pal of Alan Ryan, who was shot in the leg during the attack on Ryan. The brothers who were arrested are from Baldoyle. One of them has been involved in drug dealing. Gardai previously found one kilo of cocaine belonging to the drug dealer at his then-girlfriend's house in Dun Laoghaire in south Dublin. Sources said he has also robbed Nigerian drug dealers using the name of the Real IRA. His mother was jailed in England in 2004 after she was caught up in a multi-million euro international drug network run by British gang boss Owen Clarke.
Affair
THREAT: Paschal Kelly
Sources in Sligo say the group has been making a number of extortion demands in the county using the name of the IRA even though most of Ryan's former cronies have been kicked out of the organisation. Locals also claim a businesswoman living in Sligo was having an affair with Ryan at the time of his murder.
Other key associates of Ryan in Dublin have been living in fear since his killing. Two well-known members, originally from the northside of the city, have been living together in the south city in recent weeks. Gardai recently warned one of the men his life is in danger. Homes of both men have been attacked since Ryan's murder.
