Armed unit protect father on bread round

DANIEL TREACY’S father, Phil, who owns the family bread business, is protected by armed gardaí when he goes on his bread rounds since the Kieran Keane trial in which another of his sons, Owen, was the key state witness.

Owen Treacy who survived 17 stab wounds when he was abducted with Kieran Keane, gave evidence which led to the conviction of five members of the McCarthy Dundon gang for the murder of Kieran Keane in January 2003.

Following the murder of businessman, Roy Collins last April, Phil Treacy gave his only interview to the Irish Examiner in which he said he would not be stopped from working in his business by the McCarthy Dundons.

Mr Treacy, aged 60, said he would not be alive but for the armed gardaí who escort him on his daily bread round in the city.

Mr Treacy, is married to a sister of gang figure, Christy Keane.

He is followed every day by two heavily armed members of the Emergency Response Unit as he goes on his daily bread round in the city.

In the April 2009 interview, in the wake of the murder of Mr Collins, he vowed to keep working.

He said: “I have worked since I was 11. Why should I give in to them [McCarthy/ Dundons]? That unfortunate man [Roy Collins] was shot because a cousin gave evidence against one of them and he got 10 years. What are we supposed to do? Lie down? I am not going to lie down. I work seven days a week and will still do it. I haven’t taken a holiday in 12 years. People have to stand up.

“My son Owen stood up to them and lived after they stabbed him 17 times. I am proud of him. I am not in dread of these scum. Why should I be?

“I would be dead and buried only for the guards, and the protection they have given me every day after they [McCarthy Dundon gang members] got life for murdering my brother-in- law.

“The guards have been more than good. Only for them I’d be dead. I take it from day to day. I get up at 6.15am and start my round at 7.15am and finish my round at 4.15pm. I then go down to the bakery at 6pm and stay there until around 10pm. It is my life.”

Mr Treacy went on to express his sympathy for the Collins family.

“They have done nothing only do a day’s work and these scum kill him. The bakery business is my life, and I like my customers. I make up to 40 stops at shops in the city every day and I go into Ballinacurra Weston [the McCarthy Dundon base] and Southill, and meet the best of people.”

“I will never give in to them. They are only the scum of the earth. They have shot a young lad because his family stood up against them. People have to stand up. If I don’t do it, I’d be better off in Tony Cross’s [local undertakers]. We have suffered at the hands of these people, but they did not drive us out and they are not going to do it now.”