Hurling star suffers woes in business world

Ten years ago, DJ Carey was preparing for a hurling season that would see him win his third of five All-Ireland medals.

At the time, he was married with two children, Sean and Michael, and growing his family cleaning business across the country.

Last night, after a period of personal and financial torment, he was lying in a Kilkenny hospital after suffering a suspected heart attack at the age of 41.

His business life has fallen apart. The court ordered him and his then partner, businesswoman Sarah Newman, to repay €9.5m.

And on Sunday, Ms Newman, a highly successful self-made millionaire and star of television’s Dragons Den, described to a newspaper how their seven-year relationship had ended amid corporate debts and suspicions of irregularities in his companies.

Ms Newman said that she had called in the gardaí to investigate what happened and this inquiry was ongoing.

A recent holiday on an island in the Indian Ocean was not enough to salvage the relationship that started on their mutual love of golf.

Word of Carey’s suspected heart attack comes despite his obvious fitness levels and his life as a non-smoker and non-drinker.

Without question the Kilkenny corner forward was the standout hurler of the late 1990s and early 2000s.

He collected nine All-Star gongs and helped to guide his side into a period when they dominated the sport.

His 2003 All-Ireland medal was won in the shadow of intense media interest in the breakup of his marriage to Christine, which the couple had hoped to keep private.

The Gowran native retired while the team was still rising in stature and he focused on his expanding business interests.

However, the growth of his three companies and the properties in which he and Ms Newman invested proved impossible to maintain once the bubble burst.

Carey had financed his business with €7.8m of loans taken out with Irish Nationwide.

This was refinanced with AIB and secured against golf resort properties at Ladycastle, the K Club and the Inch, Mount Juliet.

It was guaranteed by his partner, Ms Newman. He had guaranteed her mortgage of €1.5m in return. She owned a luxurious chalet in Switzerland that was sold at the end of last year.

The banks began to move against him in early 2011, writing to him three times about arrears on the accounts and getting no reply.

They eventually looked for a judgment and both Carey and Ms Newman consented.

By that stage, his sister Catriona, who was formerly a co-director in his businesses, had set up a rival cleaning company with other family members. Ms Carey, a former Irish hockey international, had been replaced as a director in Carey’s business by Ms Newman in 2009.

When his three firms went into liquidation last year they had debts of €1.7m.

Mr Carey’s business, DJ Carey Enterprises, was bought from liquidation by Western Hygiene. He was hired by this firm as a sales manager. But it was reported that he is no longer employed by them.