A financial adviser charged with laundering over £3 million stg stolen in the Northern Bank robbery told gardaí during an interview that the-then chairman of the Bank of Scotland (Ireland), Phil Flynn, was behind the money laundering operation, a court heard today.
Ted Cunningham (60) told interviewing gardaí that he wanted to speak to them without being videorecorded and during the interview at the Bridewell Garda Station in Cork on February 18th, 2005, he named Mr Flynn as the main person behind the attempts to launder money.
"Look, Phil Flynn is the boss behind everything," said Mr Cunningham during the off-camera interview with Det Chief Supt Tony Quilter and Det Garda Jim Fitzgerald at the Bridewell Garda Station, according to a garda transcript of the interview
Details of the transcript were given yesterday by Det Chief Supt Quilter on the 18th day of Mr Cunningham's trial for money laundering offences before a jury of seven men and five women and Judge Con Murphy at Cork Circuit Criminal Court.
Mr Cunningham denies 20 charges of money laundering including one of possessing £3,010,380 stg at Farran between December 20th, 2004 and February 16th, 2005, knowing or believing it to be the proceeds of robbery at the Northern Bank Cash Centre in Belfast.
The court had already heard that Mr Flynn had been introduced to Mr Cunningham by ex-ICC Chief Executive Denis O'Connell and that he accepted an invite by Mr Cunningham and his business partner, Irene Johnstone to become a director of their company, Chesterton Finance.
Det Chief Supt Quilter told the court he had gone to the Bridewell Garda Station after hearing that Mr Cunningham had indicated he wanted to speak to him and shortly after they began interviewing him on camera, he asked them to turn off the recorder.
Det Chief Supt Quilter said that Mr Cunningham blurted out details of how he had collected almost £5 million in stg in four separate transactions and how he brought the money back to his house at Farran in Co Cork where gardai found £2.3 million stg on February 16th, 2005.
Mr Cunningham told gardaí how he met a man in his 40s whom he didn't know and who was driving at Northern Ireland registered car at the Clonmore Hotel near Tullamore in Co Offaly and that the man gave him four sports bags containing £1.25 stg in cash.
The man told him to meet him a week later at the Athboy Hotel in Navan, Co Meath, and on that occasion he collected a further £1.3 million while he met him on two other occasions at Rahan nursing home at Tullybeg in Co Offaly to collect a further £2.5 million.
Det Chief Supt Quilter said Mr Cunningham told them he rang Mr Flynn after getting the first four bags and asked him how much money would he get and Mr Flynn told him that he would get £5 million and he said he could not handle £5 million but they later agreed on that sum.
Mr Cunningham knew the moment that he had opened four holdall bags containing cash he had received from a man in the carpark of a Co Offaly hotel that the money was from the Northern Bank robbery, the court was told.
Det Chief Supt Tony Quilter told Cork Circuit Criminal Court that Mr Cunningham told gardai in an off-camera interview that he suspected that the money was not legitimate but when he saw Northern Ireland stg in the bags, he knew it was from the Northern Bank raid.
Mr Cunningham told gardaí that he been put in contact with a freelance consultant, Catherine Nelson by Phil Flynn some eight months earlier and that she was the contact throughout the money laundering operation, said Det Chief Supt Quilter.
Mr Cunningham told gardaí that after he collected four bags of cash at the Clonmore Hotel and brought it back to his home in Farran, he rang Ms Nelson to tell her that he got the money and he used a code "the postman came", said Det Chief Supt Quilter.
Mr Cunningham told gardaí that Ms Nelson had put him in touch with some Bulgarians who were interested in buying a sand and gravel pit at Shinrone in Co Offaly which he part owned and all financial transactions were to be disguised as relating to the pit, he told the court.
Det Chief Supt Quilter said that Mr Cunningham told them that "when I opened the first bag and saw the Ulster Bank notes, I knew well. I rang Catherine and told her I needed to meet her and she said 'The boys will sort it out - not to panic'".
Mr Cunningham went on to tell gardaí that Ms Nelson told him 'You are selling a pit - it all has to do with selling the pit, don't worry about' and he said "he knew damn well what it [the money] was" said Det Chief Supt Quilter.
Asked off-camera about what he suspected in relation to the notes, Mr Cunningham said, "When I opened the bag I saw Northern sterling, I was not a fool. When I saw the Northern notes I knew what it was, I suspected it was from the Northern Bank job." Cunningham said.
Mr Cunningham told gardaí the Bulgarian plan to buy the sand pit was true but the deal was never done. "I came up with the idea to pretend I had a buyer for the pit. In effect I was laundering the money from the Northern Bank job by buying the pit and putting it in a bogey Bulgarian company name."
Det Chief Supt Quilter rejected a suggestion by Mr Cunningham's counsel, Ciaran O'Loughlin SC that gardai had coerced Mr Cunningham into making the statement by saying they would leak to the press that he had named IRA figures and he would end up with a bullet in the head.
The case continues