Spanish court issues international arrest warrant for John Gilligan’s son

Darren Gilligan was a no-show at a courthouse last October where he and his father were among nine people due to take the stand on drugs and weapons charges

John Gilligan (left) and his son, Darren, in October 2020. File picture: Collins Courts

An international arrest warrant has been issued for John Gilligan’s son ahead of the Irish man's trial on drugs and weapons charges.

Spanish court officials confirmed Darren Gilligan was now officially a wanted man after his no-show at a courthouse last October where he and his father were among nine people due to take the stand.

On Tuesday, it emerged the 71-year-old convicted drugs baron has been told his day in court has again been put back because of a second suspension.

Dubliner Gilligan was due to appear at a court in the Costa Blanca resort of Torrevieja on Monday, April 17, for the start of a three-day trial spread over a week.

The timing of the hearing meant he would have stood in the dock the same day as Gerry ‘The Monk’ Hutch learns his fate at the Special Criminal Court in Dublin.

Hutch, who has just turned 60, could face life in prison if he is convicted of the February 2016 murder of Kinahan cartel associate David Byrne at the Regency Hotel.

Gilligan has been warned he faces more than eight years in jail if convicted of the crimes he has been charged with and the possibility he could try to strike a plea bargain deal on day one of his trial had not been ruled out.

John Gilligan was due to appear at a court in the Costa Blanca resort of Torrevieja on Monday, April 17, for the start of a three-day trial spread over a week. File photo: Sam Boal/RollingNews.ie

A spokesman for the judges due to head the Spanish hearing said: “Orihuela Criminal Court Number Two, with its HQ in Torrevieja, has provisionally suspended the trial due to start there next Monday, due to conflicting diary commitments of the lawyers involved. The intention is that in the next few weeks a new trial date is agreed.” 

Court officials, confirming the only one of the nine suspects who failed to show up when the initial trial date was scheduled last October, was now on the run added: “The court has issued a national and international arrest warrant for this person.” It was not immediately clear when the arrest order making Darren Gilligan a wanted man had been signed and issued.

Well-placed sources said of the trial suspension: “There was some initial talk about rescheduling it for the start of May but that date has also proved difficult and the various lawyers involved are now going to try to get together in the near future to come up with a new date they can all do.

“At the moment we just don’t know whether it’s going to be before the summer or after the summer. The important thing is that the new date that is agreed upon is abided by so this doesn’t turn into a farce.” 

Friends said Darren Gilligan was back in Ireland and short of money after he failed to show in court last year. Officials are understood to have made attempts to track him down before declaring him in contempt of court and paving the way for his arrest warrant.

Gun

His father was charged with four crimes following his arrest in October 2020 at his former home in Torrevieja. State prosecutors demanded an 18-month prison sentence for unlawful weapons possession after a gun Spanish police linked to Veronica Guerin’s 1996 assassination was found hidden in the back garden of the detached property.

Detectives said, when he was arrested, the gun was the “same make and model” as the one used to kill the reporter in an ambush at a red light on the outskirts of Dublin in June 1996.

However, Spanish state prosecutors went on to describe it as a Colt Defender and not the rare Colt Python .357 Magnum police identified it as immediately after the Gilligan detention.

Prosecutors also said in a pre-trial indictment they wanted John Gilligan jailed for another two years if convicted of smuggling cannabis into Ireland, four years for illegally exporting powerful sleeping pills and 10 months for membership of a criminal gang. His conviction on all four charges could result in a prison sentence of eight years and four months.

The other eight suspects, as well as his son, include Gilligan’s British girlfriend Sharon Oliver and his playboy pal ‘Fat’ Tony Armstrong.

Armstrong, investigated but never charged over the murders of Shane Coates and Stephen Sugg after their bodies were discovered under a Costa Blanca warehouse he rented in July 2006, was held in a second round of arrests in February 2021.

The pre-trial indictment submitted to court officials after a lengthy judicial probe accused Gilligan of masterminding a plot to smuggle drug deliveries from Spain to Ireland inside consignments of toys and flip-flops.

Prosecutors say the drugs included cannabis and thousands of prescription-only sleeping pills dubbed zimmos which heroin addicts use to help them sleep and numb pain. The specialist police operation involved an organised crime unit using phone taps and following him in his car.

Gilligan, released from prison in Ireland in October 2013 after serving 17 years of a 20-year sentence for trafficking cannabis resin, was the only one of the nine people indicted over the weapons find.

Of the gun, the prosecutors have said in their indictment: 

The pistol, with its case and ammunition was buried in the garden and at John Gilligan’s disposal. It has been catalogued as a short firearm equipped for use.

Adding the chief suspect had no licence for the firearm, it added: “The cartridges were in good condition, hadn’t been modified and were apt for use with the pistol that was seized.” The number of powerful sleeping pills seized totalled more than 27,000.

Police sources said at the time of the initial October 2020 arrests that the raid on Gilligan’s villa crucially took place as he was preparing a delivery to Ireland of marijuana and zimmos.

In a statement before it was reported the weapon found buried in his garden was not the one used in the Veronica Guerin murder, Spain’s National Police said: “The revolver that has been found is the same mark and model as the one used in the assassination of an Irish journalist in Dublin in 1996.

“Spanish officers are working with the Irish police to determine if it’s the same gun used to end her life.” Gilligan was tried for Ms Guerin’s murder with other members of his drugs gang after a former soldier who prepared the gun used to kill her agreed to turn State’s witness and was given immunity from prosecution.

Judge Diarmuid O’Donovan admitted, as he acquitted him at Dublin’s Special Criminal Court, he had “grave suspicions” the drugs baron was involved in the killing. Former friend Brian ‘Tosser’ Meehan was convicted of the crime reporter’s murder.

Although Gilligan was acquitted of ordering the murder in 2001, he was convicted of importing two tons of cannabis resin worth £32m and sentenced to 28 years in prison which was reduced on appeal. His whereabouts, and that of his partner’s, was not clear on Tuesday.