'Links' in €1.9m drugs deal jailed for six years

Two men who acted as the link between two sinister Dublin drugs gangs in a £1.5m (€1.9m) heroin deal have been jailed for six years by Judge Yvonne Murphy.

Two men who acted as the link between two sinsister Dublin drugs gangs in a £1.5m (€1.9m) heroin deal have been jailed for six years by Judge Yvonne Murphy.

Brian McDermott and Brian Grendon met with Christopher Lacken (36) in the car park of the Silver Granite pub in Palmerstown where they were given a black plastic bag containing six kilos of 65% pure heroin.

McDermott and Lacken were arrested at the scene, while Grendon was caught after a car chase with gardai, Dublin Circuit Criminal Court was told.

Judge Murphy was told that two days earlier Lacken, Jeffery Mitchell, a well-known Dublin criminal, and two other men boarded a boat and only returned that morning.

McDermott (aged 23), of Oranmore Road, Ballyfermot, pleaded guilty to possession of drugs which had a market value in excess of €13,000 on November 11, 2001.

Grendon (aged 25), of Greenforth Drive, Ronanstown, admitted possession for sale or supply of heroin and dangerous driving on the same date.

Detective Sergeant Greg Sheehan revealed that both sinister gangs involved in the operation had used fatal shootings in the past on anyone who compromised their business and one young man had been executed last February because he had got in the way of a certain transaction.

Judge Murphy said life imprisonment was the maximum sentence each man faced but though both pleaded guilty to different offences she didn't see the need to distinguish between them, and felt obliged to consider a minimum sentence of 10 years for Mcdermott.

"Had the garda surveillance not been so well-managed, the amount of misery that these drugs could have caused once they'd hit the streets would have been immense," she said.

Det Sgt Sheehan told Mr George Birmingham SC, prosecuting, that gardai received confidential information in the Autumn of 2001 regarding the importation of a large quantity of heroin.

A number of people were subsequently put under surveillance and on November 9, 2001, Lacken was observed driving a silver Ford Focus on to an Irish Ferries boat at Dublin Port. Mitchell and two other men had earlier got out and walked on to the boat as foot passengers.

Two days later, Lacken was observed returning alone and gardai witnessed him removing a number of packages from behind the door panels of his car and putting them into a black plastic bag outside his home at Lohunda Downes in Clonsilla.

Det Sgt Sheehan said that on the same day gardai observed Mitchell getting off a flight at Dublin Airport. That evening two men called to his home at Monasterboice Road in Crumlin in a white Renault Clio van and were spotted leaving a short time later.

They drove to the Sliver Granite car park and Grendon was spotted getting out and meeting with Lacken. He then drove off and returned a few moments later with Mcdermott.

McDermott got out of the van and took the bag from Lacken. At that point the gardai swooped on the operation and both men were arrested. Grendon sped off down the road in the van and was forced up on the footpath to avoid a roadblock.

He entered a halting site, dumped the van and ran into a field where he was apprehended. He had thrown away the van keys and a mobile phone, which were recovered the next day.

He denied any involvement in the operation but McDermott admitted he was simply the delivery boy. They discovered that each had made a number of phone calls to each other on the day. Grendon had the initials 'JM' in his phone and had made a number of calls to the number.

Det Sgt Sheehan agreed with Mr Michael O'Higgins SC, for McDermott, that a criminal element in Crumlin had bought the drugs and were selling them to a criminal element in Ballyfermot.

Both men refused to name names when interviewed because their lives would have been at risk from gangs who murdered people in the past.

Det Sgt Sheehan said Lacken had also pleaded guilty and was awaiting sentence. Mitchell was serving a sentence for armed robbery and other proceedings against him were still pending.

Counsel for both argued that they had pleaded guilty and expressed remorse for their actions and were entitled to credit from the court for that.