A 33-year-old man from Co Louth has been returned for trial on charges connected with an alleged multi-million-pound cross-Border money laundering racket.
Mr Kieran Byrne, of Mount Pleasant, Dundalk, is charged with handling an unknown amount of money in 1998, knowing or believing it to be in whole or in part another person's proceeds of drug-trafficking or criminal activity at a bureau de change known as Dromad Enterprises, Dromad, Co Louth.
It is also alleged that he failed to take reasonable measures to establish the identity of a person for whom he proposed to trade in foreign exchange, believing the money to be in part the proceeds of drug-trafficking; and that he handled an unknown amount of cash and cheques knowing it to be the proceeds of drug-trafficking.
The defendant denies the offences and was remanded on his own bail of £30,000 with a cash surety of £100,000 by Kells District Court to a sitting of the Special Criminal Court.