‘I did not shoot Veronica Guerin’

PATRICK ‘Dutchy’ Holland can hardly expect much public sympathy for his plight. An armed robber, who also served a sentence on an explosive’s charge, he is now serving 12 years for drug-dealing.

Holland, who will be eligible for a free bus pass when he is released from prison in two years, has spent most of the last two decades behind bars.

He has also been named publicly as the man who shot journalist Veronica Guerin. Dutchy Holland freely admits he is a crook. But is he a killer and is his drug conviction a serious miscarriage of justice?