[ad_1]
One of the top lieutenants of the Kinahan Cartel has been jailed for operating a “travel service” for the mob.
Jonathan Harding organized flights worth 100,000 euros for the criminal gang as part of their intricate network of money laundering activities.
Sources believe much of the trip was for key members of the Kinahan and Byrne crime families in and out of Ireland and their havens on the Costa del Sol.
The 48-year-old also acted as a major arms dealer for the cartel and was caught red-handed with a cache of weapons that was meant to be used in his bloody war with the Hutch gang.
The career criminal previously earned the nickname ‘Rocketman’ after being linked to an attempt to smuggle RPG rocket launchers into the country with his friend, cartel boss Liam Byrne.
Harding, of Kerdiff Avenue, Naas, Co Kildare, was sentenced to five years for laundering more than € 340,000 for the Kinahan Empire between 2012 and 2016 after pleading guilty to five offenses under the Money Laundering and Terrorism Financing Act. .
Her partner Carol Davis (45) of Clonmacnoise Road, Crumlin, Dublin 22, received a suspended sentence after the Special Criminal Court heard that she was “reckless” in allowing her bank accounts to be used, but was not involved in crime. underlying.
Judge Tony Hunt described Harding as a “trusted gang supporter.”
The non-jury court found Tuesday that it “did not require a great leap of imagination” to conclude that the bank accounts belonging to Harding and his co-defendant were used as a “travel service for a serious criminal organization.”
An analysis of the accounts linked to Harding showed that 52,000 euros were spent on travel alone, but that Gardaí did not have the ability to say who took the 100 flights in question.
More than € 44,000 was spent booking flights, while another € 40,000 paid for a mobile home with Davis’s accounts.
Ms. Davis, unaware that Harding used her accounts, pleaded guilty to three crimes under the same law and received a three-year suspended sentence.
The scam was discovered when Harding was arrested with a cache of cartel guns in January 2017 when Gardai raided a location in Greenogue, Rathcoole, Dublin 24.
Harding and another cartel associate nicknamed ‘Mr Nobody’ due to their low profile were caught with an arsenal large enough “to arm a small country.”
It included a Kalashnikov, a submachine gun, and a semi-automatic weapon.
Harding previously pleaded guilty to possession of nine revolvers, four pistols, a submachine gun, an assault rifle and several ammunition magazines and was sentenced to ten years in prison with a one-year suspension in January 2018.
In July 2019, ‘Mr Nobody’ Declan Brady (54) was sentenced to 11 and a half years in prison after pleading guilty to possession of the weapons.
Judge Hunt said that after the search of the business facilities, a follow-up search was conducted at Harding’s home in Naas that uncovered financial information that led to the Criminal Assets Bureau (CAB) freezing an AIB account with 48,553 euros before being seized by the State.
Gardaí investigated information on 13 accounts at various financial institutions, and five accounts were deemed relevant to the Harding and Davis laundering charges.
Two of the accounts were in Harding’s name, while three were in Davis’s name and related to EBS, Bank of Ireland and AIB accounts.
Harding had described himself as a freelance “mobile mechanic,” but he had no limited partnership status or trade name.
Judge Hunt said that Harding had accepted responsibility for using Davis’s account without his knowledge.
Judge Hunt said that Harding had pleaded guilty at the first opportunity and had expressed remorse in a letter lamenting his relapse into crime after his release from prison in 2009.
The judge said that the aggravating factors in Harding’s case were the facilitation of the activities of a criminal organization, of which Harding was a “trusted adherent”, the amount of money involved – € 342,748 in total – the extended period of crimes and intentional deception of his co-defendants.
Regarding Davis, who was out on bail, the judge said he had assisted in the CAB’s investigations and that he had not received adverse care before or since his arrest.
Her attorney, Mr. Ronan Kennedy SC, said Davis made “reckless decisions”, had been of good character, had pleaded guilty at the earliest opportunity, and was a caretaker for her aunt.
The court previously heard that, with respect to an EBS account in Harding’s name, 23 cash deposits amounted to more than 66,000 euros from 2014 to 2016, while an AIB account for the same period was deposited more than 96,000 euros.
Carol Davis, the court heard, had three bank accounts under investigation, one at EBS, AIB and Bank of Ireland.
Between 2014 and 2016, a total of just over € 136,000 was deposited into your EBS account and a similar amount was withdrawn over the same time period.
The total deposits in the AIB account held in its name, between 2012 and 2016, amounted to € 117K with a similar amount withdrawn.
A Bank of Ireland account in your name for the period 2015-2016 showed a total deposit of around € 13K with more than € 17K withdrawn during the same period.
[ad_2]