Quinn admits that life in Mountjoy was ‘tough’

Bankrupt former tycoon Seán Quinn has expressed fears of being sent back to jail.

The one-time billionaire walked free from the training unit in Mountjoy shortly after 9am yesterday to return to his family home in Ballyconnell, Co Cavan, after serving a nine-week sentence for contempt of court.

In November, the 66-year-old was jailed for not purging his contempt in the High Court for his role in an asset-stripping plot. Quinn is currently embroiled in a bitter legal wrangle with the former Anglo Irish Bank — now the Irish Bank Resolution Corporation (IBRC). The bank is pursuing the family for debts wracked up through a €2.8bn failed share deal.

Last year, High Court judge Elizabeth Dunne ruled Quinn, his son Seán Jr and his nephew Peter Darragh Quinn, had attempted to put a multimillion-euro asset portfolio beyond the reach of the IBRC.

After his release, Quinn said a return to jail was possible if the “charade” being pursued against his family in the courts continued. “Can we go back to jail? Yes we can,” he said.

He said the hardest thing about prison was the amount of time he was locked in his cell. “I found it tough but when you come to 66 years of age I suppose you have been through many a thing over that period — I could fit into most environments and I fitted in,” he told BBC Northern Ireland.

“Of course when you find a door slamming at 9 o’clock at night, and you close for the night, it’s not nice and it’s not something I’m used to and it’s not something I felt I deserved, but that’s the world we’re working in.”

The former billionaire said his experience in Mountjoy made him feel lucky for the family and friends he has at home. “I wouldn’t call it frightening but it would certainly make you think,” he said.

Quinn said he received a positive reaction from inmates. “100% of them felt I shouldn’t be there, I certainly felt I shouldn’t be there, after creating 7,000 jobs, after never in my life did I owe anyone a penny, never in my life did I steal a penny that didn’t belong to me, I felt it was just wrong.”

The tycoon was heavily critical of IBRC and those who had taken over the running of his administration-hit empire. But he insisted the family had not been defeated. “The Quinns are not killed off,” he said. “The Quinns are still there.”

Seán Quinn Jr, who was also jailed for three months over the summer, has since offered to sell the penthouse apartment he shares with wife Karen on the outskirts of Dublin’s Phoenix Park to demonstrate his willingness to purge contempt.

Peter Quinn, son of former GAA president Peter Quinn, was also sentenced for contempt but remains on the run after he fled to Northern Ireland.

Yesterday Quinn’s supporters claimed he should never have been jailed in the first place and warned that the Quinn family was prepared to “go as far as it goes” in contesting the various cases against them, including the European courts.

In Virginia Co Cavan, a large sign with the words ‘Welcome home Sean Quinn’ was mounted on a parked JCB. The Concerned Irish Citizens group, which has lent vocal backing to the Quinns, said the Government, IBRC, and any other stakeholders involved should sit down and “hammer out a deal” with the family.