A Co Louth man was found with more than €171,000 in cash when gardaí searched his home in a drugs raid, Dundalk Circuit Court heard yesterday.
The court was told that Michael Hodgins jnr, Pearse Park, Drogheda, began using drugs after he was jailed 16 years ago for the manslaughter of Slane game-keeper Timothy Kidman.
Hodgins (35) pleaded guilty to possession of cocaine for sale and supply, and two counts of unlawful possession of cocaine and amphetamine, at Pearse Park, Drogheda, on April 15th, 2005.
The court heard that when gardaí arrived at his home with a search warrant, he was standing with another person outside his front door.
The other man ran into and through the house and was seen throwing something into the garden next door.
Gardaí subsequently recovered a bag of cocaine.
During the search itself, Garda Tom Quinn found a loose board under a cupboard, and on removing it discovered a plastic lunch box containing a bag of white powder.
Beside that was an egg-shaped container like an artificial rugby ball, which also held a bag of powder. A briefcase was also recovered from behind a bath panel.
The court heard Hodgins had become aggressive and upset when gardaí arrived to carry out the search, but calmed down and went to his mother's house across the road.
Garda Quinn told the court he went over to the home of Hodgins's parents and while he was not there, his father and his wife returned to the house where the search was being carried out.
When the briefcase was opened it was found to contain €171,500 in cash. The money was in 18 bundles. Some of the cash was held together with elastic bands and other bundles were wrapped completely with masking tape.
The court heard that the bag of powder recovered from a garden next door had been bought off Hodgins.
A 6-mm air pistol, baseball bats, mixing agents and a cocaine mix were found along with a weighing scales and a hollowed- out soft-drink can "designed to conceal substances".
The court heard that Hodgins had a number of previous convictions including one imposed at the Central Criminal Court in April 1990 for the manslaughter of Mr Kidman at Slane Castle the previous year.
He was also sentenced at Drogheda Circuit Court for burglary, larceny and malicious damage in June 1990 and the most recent conviction at Kells District Court in November 2003 was for careless driving.
The court was told that Hodgins had claimed he had saved the money found in the briefcase since his early release from prison after serving eight years of his sentence.
In applying for an adjournment of sentencing, so he could fully prepare a defence, Derek Kenneally SC, defending, asked Judge Pat McCartan to direct that a probation and welfare report be prepared.
However the judge refused the application, saying that would only be warranted if there was a chance of a non-custodial sentence being imposed. He did not believe that would be the outcome of this case.
After hearing that gardaí had no objection to a remand on continuing bail, he adjourned sentencing until June 13th.