Socialite conman Breifne O'Brien jailed for 7 years

Once described as the "poster boy for the worst excesses of the Celtic Tiger", fraudster businessman Breifne O’Brien has been jailed for seven years for running a Ponzi scheme that cost his victims millions of euro.

Ireland’s Bernie Madoff, O’Brien used stolen millions to fund his lavish lifestyle — paying for an extension to his house, a new car for his wife and the stamp duty on new properties, in the multi-million euro scheme.

He convinced long-standing friends from his days in Trinity College Dublin and family business associates that he was linked to property deals in Paris, Manchester, and Hamburg, and a shipping insurance scheme.

The deals were all bogus. O’Brien used fake letters and invented connections to international businessmen and lawyers to get the victims to continue to give him money.

O’Brien, aged 52, of Kilmore, Monkstown Grove, Co Dublin, pleaded guilty at Dublin Circuit Criminal Court to 14 sample counts out of a total of 45 theft and deception charges at National Irish Bank and Ulster Bank, Donnybrook, Dublin on dates between 2003 and 2008. O’Brien, whose family home is Carrigrohane Castle, Co Cork, had denied all charges, but changed his plea to guilty on the day his trial was due to start.

The court heard the total loss to the five victims is €8.5m and that O’Brien owes further amounts to other creditors.

Shane Costello, prosecuting, said that so far, €420,000 has been recovered through the release of assets owned by O’Brien but none of this is available to the victims. At a previous hearing, it was incorrectly stated that the amount recovered was €2m.

Counsel for O’Brien said he has already transferred his entitlement to £1.065m (€1.352m) worth of shares in a UK computer gaming company to the creditors group but that these shares have not yet been realised.

He has also signed documents in relation to other loan notes and investments and has been in early discussions with a group of investors with regard to other foreign properties.

At his earlier sentencing hearing, lawyers for the fraudster said he is now destitute and is living on social welfare of €188 a week. They said he was now shunned and socially ruined.

He is now behind bars.