Money-laundering trial adjourned

The trial of a Co Cork chef arrested as part of a garda investigation into IRA money-laundering was further adjourned until next month at the Special Criminal Court in Dublin today.

Don Bullman (aged 31), a chef and father of two of Fernwood Crescent, Leghanamore, Wilton, Co Cork, was charged in February last year with membership of an illegal organisation styling itself the Irish Republican Army, otherwise Oglaigh na hEireann, otherwise the IRA on February 16.

His trial was originally fixed for March 22 but was adjourned last month after the court was told that extensive documentation had been received by the defence, including hand-written documents and CCTV footage.

The court remanded Bullman on continuing bail until May 3 next when the case will be mentioned again.

Last year during a bail hearing, Detective Superintendent Diarmuid O' Sullivan of the Special Detective Unit said that gardaí had found a bag containing a Daz box containing more than €94,000 wrapped in three individual wrappings of €30,000 each when Bullman was arrested at Heuston Station in Dublin in a northern-registered jeep.

The Detective Superintendent said during that hearing that Bullman was "a central individual" to the activities of the IRA prior to February 16, 2005 and that activity was "a money-laundering operation for the IRA, in which he is central".