Court told of Gilligan's threats

John Gilligan effectively admitted his role as leader of a drugs gang in a number of threatening letters written to former accomplices before they testified against him at his trial, the Court of Criminal Appeal was told yesterday.

The Special Criminal Court had correctly found as a fact that letters written by Gilligan while in custody in England contained threats to a number of former accomplices who were preparing to give evidence at his trial in Ireland, Mr Peter Charleton SC, for the DPP, said.

That finding of fact, when taken together with several other pieces of circumstantial evidence and other facts, constituted corroboration for the finding that Gilligan was part of a drugs gang operating out of Greenmount Industrial Estate, Harold's Cross, Dublin, counsel said.

There was no other reasonable explanation for all these matters and Gilligan had not proffered any.

Mr Charleton also denied suggestions by Gilligan's lawyers that the State had "paid" for evidence. The SCC found that gardaí had given to some witnesses, who had testified against Gilligan, monies that the SCC believed was likely to be the proceeds of crime and said that was undesirable and unjustifiable. While the DPP accepted the money should not have been given to the men, it was not equivalent to paying for testimony, he said.

Mr Charleton was continuing his submissions opposing Gilligan's appeal against his conviction by the non-jury SCC in March 2001 on charges of possession of cannabis resin and having the drug for sale and supply.

Gilligan is serving a 28-year sentence for the offences.

The SCC acquitted Gilligan of the murder of journalist Veronica Guerin on June 26th, 1996, and also acquitted him of firearms charges.

Yesterday, Mr Charleton urged the three-judge CCA, presided over by Mr Justice McCracken, not to look at the various pieces of circumstantial evidence in the case in isolation but to look at the overall picture they presented. This, he said, was consistent with Gilligan's involvement in the importation of tonnes of cannabis resin from 1994. While Gilligan was not required to give an explanation for various matters, his failure to do so had consequences, counsel said.

It meant the SCC had to scour the evidence to find an explanation. The only reasonable explanation for a number of matters was that Gilligan headed a drugs gang involved in importing cannabis.

The SCC was also entitled to use lies told by Gilligan as corroboration of some of the evidence against him. Gilligan, for example, had denied he knew John Dunne, a former accomplice who testified against him, but it was clear that in a letter from Gilligan to Russell Warren, another accomplice, that Gilligan knew Dunne. Counsel said the evidence established that Gilligan paid £1,000 for the importation of crates which were brought in secret circumstances to the Ambassador Hotel car-park, where they were collected by another man.

The boxes went to Greenmount Industrial Estate and traces of cannabis resin were found in these.

The importations occurred regularly, on a fortnightly basis over a 2½-year period, and involved tonnes of drugs, Mr Charleton said.

Counsel read from a letter written by Veronica Guerin in September 1995 to Gilligan seeking to interview him about his equestrian centre in Co Kildare. While the letter was polite, it indicated here was a crime reporter who wanted to talk to Gilligan about his "tremendous achievement" in constructing the centre in such a short time. Threats were issued against Ms Guerin a week later.

This was circumstantial evidence of violent threats issued to protect a criminal empire, counsel said.

The evidence of barrister Mr Felix McEnroy also showed the propensity of Gilligan to protect his criminal enterprise by issuing threats, he added. In a letter written by Gilligan from prison to Russell Warren, Gilligan was giving Warren directions, telling Warren to get into the witness box and say that gardaí had made him tell lies about Gilligan.

The appeal continues today.