Jonathan Dowdall could implicate more than a dozen people in the Regency Hotel killing if he testifies in the murder trial of Gerry “The Monk” Hutch.
The Irish Mirror can reveal the ex-Sinn Fein councillor, who pleaded guilty with his father Patrick to facilitating the attack which left Kinahan enforcer David Byrne dead, provided gardai with a 50-page statement. Seventeen people have been killed in the feud which erupted after the attack on the North Dublin hotel in February 2016.
The trial against Hutch, who denies Byrne’s murder, begins at the Special Criminal Court today and is now being described as the “gangland trial of the century”. Dowdall’s guilty plea has sparked blind panic among the Hutch gang.
Read more: Gerry 'The Monk' Hutch 'laughed' at gardai after he was arrested and taken from cell
One source said: “They are s****ing themselves about what is in that statement. The expectation now is some of them will flee.”
Last week it emerged two senior members of a criminal gang arrived at Dowdall’s family home in North Dublin on Wednesday within hours of his guilty plea being made public. The gangsters – one of whom is a convicted killer while the other survived a murder bid by the Kinahan cartel – said they were looking for him and his father Patrick.
A source added: “This incident, which was caught on CCTV, shows the level of fear among the Hutch gang about what evidence will emerge about them all during this upcoming trial for the Monk. From that point of view, the Monk’s trial is going to be the gangland trial of the century.”
If Dowdall is to give evidence, it is expected he will be placed in the witness protection programme. The programme, managed by the Garda’s crime and security division, is designed to protect witnesses in the run-up to a trial and to help them relocate with new identities to a new jurisdiction after proceedings finish.
Last Wednesday, Dowdall, 44, and his 65-year-old father, pleaded guilty to facilitating the alleged murder of David Byrne at the Regency Hotel in 2016 as part of the Hutch-Kinahan feud. The move came as a shock as Jonathan Dowdall was due to go on trial today alongside Gerry Hutch accused of Byrne’s murder.
Dowdall and his father were released on bail but the younger man was led away from the court by gardai via a secure area and did not use the main public entrance. It means just Hutch, of The Paddocks, Clontarf, North Dublin 3, will stand in the dock of the Special Criminal Court today.
Last September, he was brought to the non-jury court under heavy security just hours after a military aircraft flew the 58-year-old from Madrid to Casement Aerodrome in Baldonnell following a lengthy extradition battle.
That came after the High Court issued a European Arrest Warrant following an application from the DPP for his arrest on suspicion of murdering Byrne. He was shot dead at the hotel after five men, three of whom were disguised as armed gardai, stormed the building during a boxing weigh-in.
Hutch was extradited from Spain after his final appeal was rejected by a Spanish court on September 14. He was being held in a Madrid prison.
The defendant has been in custody since being arrested by the Guardia Civil in a restaurant in Fuengirola on the Costa del Sol on August 12. A search for him began last April after Ireland issued a European Arrest Warrant.
In fighting his extradition from Spain, Hutch argued he was under threat in Ireland from criminal groups. The Spanish court rejected this argument stating Irish authorities are capable of keeping him safe.
His nephew Patrick Hutch, who was also charged with Byrne’s murder, walked from the Special Criminal Court in 2019 after charges were dropped.
READ NEXT:
- Gerry 'The Monk' Hutch arrested and taken from prison cell over suspected organised crime offences
- Daniel Kinahan flees Dubai bolthole and searches for safe-haven in Asia
- Gardai analysing 'crucial information' that could help prosecute key members of Kinahan cartel
- Kinahan cartel flew millions of cocaine into Ireland on private plane
- Daniel Kinahan faces court after snubbing CAB in bid to seize property
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