Cunningham 'very,very happy' after convictions quashed

Financier Ted Cunningham has said he is "very very happy" after his conviction for laundering STG£2.4m from the Northern Bank raid was quashed.

However the 63-year-old from Farran, Co Cork is facing a retrial on nine less serious charges of laundering smaller sums from the £26.5m robbery in Belfast in December 2004.

Ted Cunningham was sentenced to 10 years in prison in 2009 and is the only man jailed in connection with the Northern Bank raid.

Today the most serious of his money laundering convictions has been quashed with no retrial ordered.

The warrant that led to gardaí finding STG£2.4m in a cupboard in the basement of his home in Cork has been ruled defective.

It was issued by the investigating superintendent under S29.1 of the Offences Against the State Act which was recently struck down by the Supreme Court as unconstitutional, on the basis that warrants must be issued by Superintendents who are independent to the case at hand.

The DPP accused Cunningham's lawyers of "piggy-backing" on this relatively new case but the court ruled the legal point was raised before his appeal was determined.