Priory Hall developer Tom McFeely bound to keep peace

The bankrupt Priory Hall developer and former IRA hunger striker Tom McFeely has been bound over to keep the peace arising out of a dispute at an address in south Co Dublin on February 12th last.

The row, which occurred in the late evening, involved McFeely and a woman, whom Tallaght District Court Judge John Lindsay ruled could not be identified.

The court heard evidence that McFeely threatened to slit her throat and send her to America in a box.

The woman also said McFeely demanded money which he claimed she had stolen from him.

McFeely faced two charges of breaching a protection order taken out on November 11th, 2016, and heard on January 10th, 2017. The order was granted to the woman and against McFeely and directed him not to threaten her.

It was alleged that he breached the order on two occasions, on February 12th last and February 20th.

McFeely said in evidence that he did not know of the existence of the order on the two dates, a view challenged by gardaí who maintained that it had been delivered to an address, handed to McFeely by the woman, read in her presence and handed back.

Convicted

McFeely denied this and Judge Lindsay accepted a submission from McFeely's barrister, Stephen Montgomery BL, that no evidence existed to prove the notice had been served and simultaneously communicated to him verbally, as required by law. The judge dismissed the first charge.

However, he convicted McFeely arising from the row of February 12th. McFeely acknowledged it had been very heated but said he and the woman were in dispute over a lot of money and also property. He rejected the woman's testimony that she had to escape over a garden fence such was her fear of him.

McFeely criticised the attention the authorities were paying to him and said if people got their claws out of him, he and the woman would sort things out. They had to be sorted out, he said repeatedly.

A garda outlined 11 previous convictions, including failure to appear in court and drink driving but most, said the garda, related to road traffic offences going back to 2001.

“There’s some before that,” quipped McFeely, “which I’m extremely proud of” – an apparent reference to his IRA past.

Binding him over for 12 months, Judge Lindsay also imposed a bond of €400.