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Irish Mirror
Irish Mirror
National
Paul Healy

Kinahan cartel thug who helped carry out feud murder celebrates release after just four years

A Kinahan cartel thug who helped the gang carry out a feud murder has been released from prison, we can reveal.

The Irish Mirror has learned that evil thug Nathan Foley, 23, who assisted psycho mobster ‘Fat’ Freddie Thompson in carrying out the murder of Daithi Douglas, walked free from prison last week.

Mr Douglas was brutally gunned down outside his shop on Dublin’s Bridgefoot Street on July 1, 2016.

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But now Foley is among the first of the Kinahan cartel thugs who were jailed for their roles in gangland hits, to be freed — after just four years behind bars.

Foley pleaded guilty to helping a criminal gang carry out the murder in November of 2019, and was sentenced to six years in prison in January 2019.

However due to standard remission, Foley’s prison sentence came to an end last week.

Foley celebrated his release by posting several photos to social media in recent days — saying he was “chilling” as he sat in front of a large TV.

During his time in prison Foley was caught posing for several forbidden photos with fellow prisoners.

He accepted the lesser charge of helping a criminal gang to carry out the crime — having previously been charged with murder.

Although Foley’s role was to buy the phones for the hit team before the slaying, his other job was to act as a “spotter” for garda cars on the day of the hit.

His Special Criminal Court case heard how he helped facilitate the murder by driving one of four cars used during the killing — and by purchasing phones.

Footage captured Foley meeting with Freddie Thompson and Lee Canavan at Little Caesars restaurant in Dublin where they debriefed having just carried out the hit.

Canavan was separately convicted of Mr Douglas’s murder and received a life sentence last year.

Before his own sentence hearing in 2019, Foley’s defence counsel, said his client had asked him to express his regret in relation to Mr Douglas’ death.

Passing sentence, Mr Justice Hunt said he accepted that Foley was not involved in issues of strategy or planning but he had acted as a “gillie” or a “runner” for the main organiser of the killing.

Sources previously confirmed to this paper that the Kinahans wanted Douglas dead because they wrongly believed he was involved in a botched hit on mob boss Daniel Kinahan at the Red Cow Inn in Dublin in 2015.

Evil Thompson, 37, was sentenced to life on August 30, 2018 after being found guilty of murdering Douglas.

Daithi Douglas’ wife Yumei previously told this paper: “I know since Daithi got out he was never near any one of them.

“He was with me all the time I know and I believe him,” she said.

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