Gardai are working to establish if murder victim Tony Dempsey was wrongly targeted in a brutal attack over a drug debt that actually belonged to a woman.
The Irish Mirror has learned that investigators have received information that a female associate of Dempsey’s had avoided a beating, which he was the victim of.
Gardai launched a murder investigation after Dempsey, 28, died a horrific death, suffering severe head injuries and bruising to his body in a flat in Dublin’s north inner city.
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His decomposing remains were only discovered after residents in the complex raised concerns over the smell coming from the property.
Gardai discovered Dempsey’s body inside the flat on Monday evening but believe it was there for at least a week with drug users coming and going. Locals had raised concerns about the particular flat as it was being used as a “drugs den”.
As officers try to narrow down suspects, gardai have been told by locals that he may have been targeted over a drug debt which had actually been incurred by a woman known to him.
But detectives are also looking into other theories including a “spur of the moment” row in the apartment or a personal grudge.
A source said: “He may well have been wrongly targeted over a particular drug debt but there is a range of things that gardai are looking into and are narrowing down at the moment.”
At the time of the body discovery, there were people present while others came in and they were interviewed by gardai but there are a number of issues to work through.
Another source said: “There is a lot of difficulty in these cases as you are dealing with addicts who have serious issues. So there’s a major workload in deciphering between truth and fiction.
"There were also a number of people coming in and out of this apartment, so it’s about establishing who was there in the time his body lay there and also who was present when he was beaten.”
Dempsey is originally from New Road in Inchicore in Dublin and was not a resident of the flat his body was found in.
Charity Peter McVerry Trust confirmed that it managed the property under the Housing First programme for Dublin City Council. The tenant was successfully accommodated in the property over eighteen months ago, it said.
But the charity stated that the tenancy began to break down over recent months, as the tenant was “struggling to manage the front door and individuals, who had no interest in the property or the tenant’s recovery, were gaining entry to and using the property.”
Dempsey was not a client of the Peter McVerry Trust, but they knew of him and passed on its condolences.
Dempsey had done various stints behind bars and had a long rap sheet of at least 50 convictions including 22 for road traffic offences, and others for theft, drugs, criminal damage and possession of knives and firearms.
As a youth, he was well-known to gardai in the Dublin city area. In 2014, he was sentenced to two years over a vicious attack in Dublin’s south inner city in the previous year. On that occasion, he and others beat a man with their fists, then a crutch before knifing him twice in the back.
He was jailed for four years after a 2017 attack in which he bit off the ears off another man.
Dempsey had come from a deprived background in which a court previously heard he had an “horrifically chaotic” upbringing. He had been placed in care ten times and as an adult underwent treatment for drugs in a rehabilitation centre.
The Dubliner had also spent spells homeless but his family yesterday were grieving over his loss, vowing to get justice for him.
One said: “It’s not a dream, it’s real, don’t worry we will get justice for you. Our lives will never be the same again. All the kids are heartbroken. I hope the dirty scum rot and are caught very fast.
“The amount of people in and out of that flat had to have seen something. Please come forward, we deserve the answers so he can rest in peace and our family have closure. It’s just not fair at all. It won’t bring him back but we will get justice for you Tony, don’t worry.”
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