A woman who the High Court heard lived an “exotic” lifestyle with her crime-gang member partner is entitled to a further €6,000 from the proceeds of the sale of the family home which was found to be mainly funded from the proceeds of crime.
Charlene Lam and her partner, Hutch gang member James “Mago” Gately, were last June given four months to vacate their family home in Glin Drive, Coolock, Dublin.
The Criminal Assets Bureau (Cab) seized and boarded up the house earlier this month.
The couple bought the house a number of years ago for €125,000 and had put on an extension and renovations worth another €440,000.
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Along with a car and a watch which were also seized, the court found the total amount of assets paid for through crime proceeds was more than €600,000.
The Cab claims Gately has been linked to armed robberies, gangland murders and drug dealing but has not been convicted of serious offences. He was also the target of a gangland murder attempt in 2017 when he was shot five times.
Mr Justice Alexander Owens found that their “exotic” lifestyles were subsidised with crime proceeds, while the “overwhelming” proportion of their equity in their home also came from such funds.
They denied the claims and Ms Lam, who said she had no connection with crime, argued she contributed more than €16,000 to the family home mortgage since April 2019 from legitimate earnings at her “Bombshell Beauty by Charlene” beauty salon.
[ Who would buy gangland homes seized by the Criminal Assets Bureau?Opens in new window ]
The judge previously found she was entitled to €5,000 from the proceeds of sale.
In a supplemental ruling published on Thursday, Mr Justice Owens said he carried out an extensive examination of bank statements and transfers relating to Ms Lam’s accounts and that of her business.
He said the treatment of property part-acquired with proceeds of crime is subject to a requirement of proportionality.
If the evidence demonstrates that an injustice would result from a relevant order under the Proceeds of Crime Act (Section 3.1), he said the court would refrain from making such an order.
Knowledge of the source of money used by a person to acquire an interest in property is relevant in deciding whether it would be an injustice, he said.
He said he was, in this case, prepared to direct that Ms Lam receive a further payment from the net proceeds of the house sale to reflect the fact that part of the means which funded her contributions towards the mortgage payments between April 2019 and September 2022 “comprised legitimate income which was not sourced in proceeds of crime”.
Taking into account all the circumstances he had found in his judgment, he considered €6,000 to be an amount which gives fair recognition to this contribution.
