A 37-year-old man who conspired with the Kinahan cartel to assassinate Dubliner Gary Hanley has been jailed by the Special Criminal Court for eight years as part of the Hutch-Kinahan gangland feud.
Liam Brannigan from Bride Street, Dublin 8 was found guilty of conspiring with others to murder Gary Hanley at his home in Dublin in 2017. The judge referred to ten phone calls he had with the hit team on the day of what was described as a “well-planned gangland-style execution”.
Sentencing Liam Brannigan at the non-jury court today, Mr Justice Paul Coffey said the planning and organisation of the execution meant that the defendant was culpable to a very high degree and had a “central role” in the management and oversight of the plan to kill Mr Hanley.
The judge said the conspiracy was at all times carried out with “a staunch and unyielding determination” to carry out a “gangland-style execution type of murder“. The plan was elaborate and lengthy and Brannigan had been “intimately involved” in all aspects of the planning, he said.
Brannigan of Bride Street, Dublin 8, was convicted by the non-jury court in February of conspiring to murder Mr Hanley at a location within the State between September 15 and November 6, 2017. He had denied the charge.
Brannigan is the fifth man to be jailed for his role in conspiracy to murder Mr Hanley. Luke Wilson (24), from Cremona Road in Ballyfermot, Dublin; Alan Wilson (39) of New Street Gardens, Dublin 8; Joseph Kelly (35) of Kilworth Road, Drimnagh, Dublin 12; and Dean Howe (34) with an address at Oakfield, Dublin 8, all previously pleaded guilty to conspiring to murder Mr Hanley.
Luke Wilson, who also pleaded guilty to unlawful possession of a Beretta, was jailed for 11 years; Alan Wilson was given six years; Joseph Kelly, who also admitted a weapons charge, was jailed for 12 years and Dean Howe who supervised those lower down the chain of command was jailed for six years.
