Senior Kinahan figure pleads guilty to hiding €268,000 in attic

A senior figure in the Kinahan cartel, Declan Brady, has pleaded guilty at the Special Criminal Court to hiding over a quarter of a million euro in crime cash in the attic of a Kildare address.

Brady is already serving a 11.5-year jail term imposed by the same court in July 2019, after he admitted supervising a firearms arsenal including an assault rifle and thousands of rounds of ammunition that had been stashed in a Dublin business park.

On Friday the cartel lieutenant pleaded guilty at a brief hearing to possessing €268,000 that was concealed in a loft at a premises in Naas.

Brady , who is known as ‘Mr Nobody’, spoke only to answer the single charge put to him by the registrar and said: “Guilty”.

Brady (55) of The Park, Wolstan Abbey, Celbridge, Co Kildare, had been charged in February with a total of 16 non-scheduled offences. All the charges come under Section 7 of Criminal Justice Act 2010 and relate to money laundering and terrorist financing within the State.

Under Section 7 of the Act, “a person commits an offence if the person engages in acts in relation to property that is the proceeds of criminal conduct in concealing or disguising the true nature, source, location, disposition, movement or ownership of the property in converting, transferring, handling, acquiring, possessing the property”.

The alleged offences all occurred within the State between January 1st, 2012 and January 24th, 2017, inclusive.

Brady on Friday pleaded guilty before the three-judge court to concealing cash to the value of €268,940 in the attic of The Dairy, Rathasker Road, Naas, Co Kildare, on January 24, 2017.

Ms Fiona Murphy SC, prosecuting, told the court that there will be additional pleas required from Brady, his wife Deirdre Brady (53) and another co-accused, Erika Lukacs (37), when all three are before the court again on June 14th.

Mr Justice Tony Hunt, presiding, sitting with Judge Sarah Berkeley and Judge David McHugh remanded Brady in custody for sentence hearing on June 14th.

On February 19th last, Brady was also charged with concealing cash to the value of €2,000 and £10,000 in a bread-bin on the same date and at the same location, knowing or believing or being reckless as to whether the property was the proceeds of crime.

He was further charged with concealing, disguising, converting, transferring, handling, acquiring, possessing or using money credited to Ulster Bank Account and Permanent TSB, in the names of Declan Brady and wife Deirdre Brady, on various dates between January 1st, 2014 and December 31st, 2016, within the State, knowing or believing or being reckless as to whether the property was the proceeds of criminal conduct.

In July 2019, Brady pleaded guilty at the non-jury court to possessing nine revolvers, four semi-automatic pistols, a sub-machine gun, an assault rifle and 1,355 rounds of ammunition in suspicious circumstances at a fake business premises with an address at Unit 52, Block 503, Grants Drive, Greenogue Business Park, Rathcoole, Co Dublin, on January 24th, 2017.

Brady’s wife and another woman pleaded guilty at the non-jury Special Criminal Court on April 13th of this year to two crime cash laundering offences.

Ms Brady and Ms Lukacs were originally charged with a total of 52 money laundering offences when they first came before the court in February.

Ms Brady was charged with 36 non-scheduled offences and Ms Lukacs was charged with 16 non-scheduled offences.

Ms Brady, of The Bailey, Castlefarm, Naas, Co Kildare, and Ms Lukacs, with an address at Lakelands, Naas, Co Kildare, each pleaded guilty to one count on the indictment.

Ms Brady pleaded guilty to concealing or disguising the true nature or source of money credited to a Permanent TSB Account on various dates between January 1st, 2014 and December 31st, 2014, within the State, knowing or believing or being reckless as to whether the property, in the names of Declan Brady and Deirdre Brady, was the proceeds of criminal conduct.

Ms Lukacs admitted to concealing or disguising the true nature or source of money credited to an Allied Irish Bank account on various dates between January 1st, 2012 and December 31st, 2012, within the State, knowing or believing or being reckless as to whether the property, in the name of Erika Lukacs, was the proceeds of criminal conduct.