Kinahan cartel lieutenant Ross Browning’s “escape hatch” at his north Co Dublin home was “concealed with a hanging carpet” in a bedroom.
We can also reveal how Browning’s mother Julie Conway — who married retired garda David O’Brien in 2020 — made a “gushing” entry in her Book of Positive Affirmations diary describing her son as “an amazing businessman always willing to help people”. Court papers show how Ms Conway also boasted in her diary about how Ross gave her a “fab piece of land to live on,” and helped with the renovations of Chestnut Lodge in Garristown.
This is despite in her affidavit later, Ms Conway stated that he did not fund the renovation works, and that “it was imaginary” and did not happen. Browning, who has been described by the CAB as being “at the heart of the €1 billion transnational Kinahan Organised Crime Group involved in the trade of drugs, weapons and murders,” had the escape hatch leading from his house at Garristown to the shed behind it.
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The new information was revealed in an affidavit in the High Court by a senior detective. The CAB aims to seize the 37-year-old’s 1.2 acre private estate in Garristown, Co Dublin as well as two properties in Rush, Co Dublin and a property in Finglas, Dublin 17.
The CAB claim these properties “are tainted as they were purchased with the proceeds of crime” in the name of several of his family members. Members of Browning’s family, including his mother Julie Conway, sisters Cheryl and Robyn and his late grandfather William Conway, are named in the CAB case, along with Browning.
We previously reported that a Honda motorbike — registered to criminal Stephen Fowler — was discovered at the foot of the escape chute from an exit from Browning’s house into a shed, which a senior detective said “was clearly there for Browning’s use”. Fowler, of Blakestown Cottages in Clonsilla, Dublin 15 claimed in a statement to gardai that he knew “Ross Browning since he was a nipper,” and that he was “good friends with Julie [Conway, Browning’s mother].
Fowler — whom was described by CAB as a debt collector for Browning — said the reason his motorbike was in Browning’s shed was because “I asked Julie. I didn’t really ask, I said to Julie I was putting the bike in the shed and she said ‘yeah’.”
In the affidavit, a senior detective alleged that Browning, his partner and two of their children were present at the time.
“The motorbike was found in a shed at the Garristown property, adjacent to an escape hatch which led from a bedroom in the house to the shed, via a ladder and had been concealed with a hanging carpet,” the senior detective alleged in his affidavit.
A judgment by Mr Justice Alexander Owens on the CAB’s application to freeze the assets is expected at a later date.
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