Cocaine Wars (24 page)

Valerie White and her family heard the commotion from inside the house. Valerie ran across the road and saw the gunman. She noticed that he was around 5 ft 8 in, was quite stocky and wore a camouflage jacket with the hood up. She remembered that he also wore a pair of camouflage trousers. He had black hair with a long fringe, although it was possible that he was wearing a wig. He wore large brown sunglasses, in an effort to disguise himself, and his hands were covered by a pair of black gloves. Valerie noticed that the man had a tanned face and a square jaw. He held the gun in his right hand, and it was described as being black in colour with a square-shaped barrel. Valerie White shouted at the gunman, and he jumped into the front passenger side of a silver Subaru Impreza, which sped off down Bunting Road and turned right onto Balfe Road. Valerie instantly knew that Gary was dead, and she threw herself on his body and started screaming and hugging his lifeless corpse. She would later have to be forcibly removed from him, because her arms were so tightly wrapped around the dead man.

At 6.41 p.m., Garda Alan Greally was on duty at Command and Control at Harcourt Square when he answered a 999 call. The caller would not identify himself, but said that opposite Bunting Park in Crumlin, ‘There have been shots fired at a house here.' The mystery caller then added that there was ‘a male lying on the side of the road'. At 6.43 p.m., Linda White also dialled 999 and stated that a man had been shot on Bunting Road. Garda Greally immediately circulated the information over the Command and Control radio system to all the mobile patrols in the Dublin area.

Gardaí Tony Kennedy and Sue Kinsella were on patrol in the Crumlin area when they received the radio message. The two officers arrived at Bunting Road at 6.45 p.m. Garda Kennedy observed a male lying on the grass verge opposite Bunting Park. He was lying face up and appeared to be dead, and there was a lot of blood. Another four Gardaí arrived at the scene within the next two minutes. It was quickly ascertained that the man had no pulse and was dead. Bunting Road was closed to traffic, and the scene was quickly preserved, while Garda Kinsella determined that the dead man was Gary Bryan, from Brookview Crescent in Tallaght. Shortly after the arrival of the Gardaí, Fire Station Officer James Dowling, along with his colleagues, reached the scene at Bunting Road. They parked the fire engine alongside Gary Bryan and used a defibrillator to check for signs of life. It was clear that the dead man was beyond help and it was obvious to all at the scene that he had been shot several times in the body and head. An ambulance arrived a couple of minutes after the fire brigade, and James Dowling requested that they call a doctor to come and pronounce Gary Bryan dead. At 8.00 p.m., Dr James Moloney officially pronounced Bryan dead at the scene. Later that night, Garda Lorcan McCarthy accompanied his remains to the City Morgue in Marino.

Gary Bryan's parents were immediately informed about his murder. On the morning of 28 September, they identified the remains of their son to Sergeant Karen Barker from Crumlin Garda Station. That afternoon, the post-mortem examination on Bryan's remains took place, conducted by Deputy State Pathologist Dr Michael Curtin. Detective Gardaí Tom Carey and Shane Curran from the Ballistics Section, Detective Garda Pat Flynn from the Photography Section and Detective Garda Eamon Hennelly of the Fingerprints Section of the Garda Technical Bureau were also present during the post mortem. Dr Curtis concluded that Gary Bryan had died as a result of multiple gunshot wounds to the head, neck, trunk and left lower limb. These gunshots had caused injuries to Bryan's brain, right lung, heart, aorta and liver. There were a total of twelve gunshot wounds to Gary Bryan's body, six separate entrance and exit wounds. He had been hit in the scalp, the back of the head and had two wounds in the neck, behind his left ear. He had two gunshot wounds in his back, two to his chest, one to the upper left thigh, one to the anterior of the left thigh and one below the chin. Dr Curtin determined that Gary Bryan had no diseases, and toxicology tests carried out on his blood and urine found no traces of alcohol, but a cocktail of drugs was found. Among the substances in Gary Bryan's body were morphine, codeine, methadone, diazepam and benzoylecgonine, which is a metabolite of cocaine. It was clear from the toxicology report that Bryan had not managed to get himself off drugs – he was obviously abusing them in a big way.

In the immediate aftermath of Gary Bryan's death, a murder inquiry was launched from Crumlin Garda Station. Detective Superintendent Denis Donegan and Superintendent Bart Faulkner headed the investigation, with Detective Inspector Brian Sutton in day-to-day charge. Around fifty Gardaí from the local district and national units were involved in trying to catch Bryan's killer. Because Gary Bryan was the main suspect in Wayne Zambra's murder (the previous month), there was absolutely no doubt in Gardaí's minds that Gary Bryan was murdered as an act of revenge. Because it was suspected that Bryan had killed Paul Warren and Zambra, it was always likely that there would be a price on his head. So, nobody was particularly surprised when he was shot dead. Detectives immediately suspected that the Thompson gang had been responsible. The investigation team's initial findings led them in that very direction.

The first and most urgent Garda action was to interview everybody who had been in the area at the time of the murder and may have witnessed anything that could help Gardaí to find Bryan's killers.

A number of witnesses observed the events before, during and after the murder. The most disturbing account came from a couple who saw the murder take place. They were stopped at the junction of Balfe Road and Bunting Road. The couple saw a man working on his car at the footpath on Bunting Road, and then saw another man approach him. The pair then became involved in a ‘tussle'. A shot was fired and the man working on his car ran across the road and was pursued by the man carrying a gun. They heard a number of loud bangs and Gary Bryan fell to the ground. Both the witnesses saw the gunman then shoot Bryan twice in the head from close range. The gunman then jumped into a silver Subaru, which then drove off down Balfe Road. It was followed by a 01 D silver Fiat Punto. The couple were stuck in traffic behind the Punto. There were two men inside the vehicle. They pulled their hoods and hats off and started to cheer, celebrating the fact that Bryan had just been murdered. The cars then turned left onto the Long Mile Road.

Valerie White and her mother and sister all witnessed events in the lead up to and aftermath of the murder. Gardaí obviously felt that what they saw could eventually prove to be crucial in solving the case. Margaret White told detectives that she was sitting in her living room and looked out the window and saw Bryan working on his car. A man wearing a camouflage jacket, with the hood up to cover his head, then appeared and ‘lunges' at Bryan. Gary Bryan then ran towards Bunting Park, and Margaret heard a number of loud bangs seconds later. She then grabbed her two grandchildren to make sure they were safe and remained in her house.

Linda White was also in the living room, and when she heard gunshots, she rushed out of the house to bring her young son back in to make sure he was not caught up in the mayhem. She then heard four or five gunshots, but could not see what was going on because Gary Bryan's car was blocking her vision. She then saw a stocky man in an army camouflage jacket running away from the scene.

Valerie White told Gardaí what had happened before the shooting and what Bryan had said about seeing Graham Whelan.

After interviewing all the witnesses, Gardaí had determined that two cars were used to carry out the murder and execute a safe getaway: a Subaru Impreza and a Fiat Punto. At around 7.00 p.m. on the evening of the murder, Sergeant Aidan Minnock and Gardaí Jason Miley and Declan Leader came across a silver Subaru Impreza, registration 00 D 7814 on fire outside a house at Camac Park in Bluebell. The car was being hosed down by members of the Dublin Fire Brigade.

A check on the registration number established that it was fitted with false registration plates which actually belonged to a Ford Ka. The Subaru was stolen during a burglary on a house in Bray, Co. Wicklow, five days before the murder. A technical examination of the car and false registration plates did not recover anything of evidential value, but it was clearly the car that the Gardaí had been searching for.

On 3 October, Detective Garda David Finnerty located the Punto at Rossmore Lawns in Templeogue, Dublin 6 W. It was registered to the girlfriend of a member of the Freddie Thompson gang, Liam Brannigan. Brannigan was twenty-four and from Bride Street in Dublin 8. The car underwent technical examination and fingerprints were lifted from the glass on the back passenger door. Gardaí already knew that the car belonged to Liam Brannigan's then girlfriend, so they compared the prints to a set previously taken from Liam Brannigan. It turned out that the prints taken from the Fiat Punto matched Liam Brannigan's right middle finger. A number of newspapers and other items were recovered from the boot of the Punto, which were sent away for forensic examination.

Forensic evidence is one of the best ways Gardaí have of solving cases, especially murder cases. Detective Garda Shane Curran, from the Garda Technical Bureau, located a total of seven 9mm discharged cartridge cases and three 9mm cartridge bullets from where Bryan was murdered at Bunting Road. A further cartridge case and three discharged bullets were recovered from the grass verge where Bryan had fallen when he died. It was determined that the cartridges were fired from a Luger 9mm pistol. A technical examination of the empty cartridges and the bullets concluded that they had probably all originated from the same weapon and that Gardaí were most likely looking at the scenario that one gun was used to murder Bryan, and that one gunman was probably responsible for his death. Despite dozens of searches being carried out, the murder weapon was never recovered.

After carrying out over 230 lines of inquiry, arresting ten people and taking 200 witness statements, the Gardaí's theory on the murder was that Graham Whelan was driving on Bunting Road and happened upon Gary Bryan working on his car outside a house. Gardaí believe that Whelan made a phone call to one of his associates and told him that he had just seen Bryan. Detectives believe that a twenty-three-year-old from Drimnagh and a nineteen-year-old from Tallaght were then dispatched to carry out the murder. The twenty-three-year-old pulled the trigger and jumped into the waiting Subaru, which then fled the scene.

Gardaí had come to this theory from mobile phone records and CCTV footage. In the immediate aftermath of the murder, officers had spent a lot of time attempting to trace the movements of the Subaru getaway car. It drove from Bunting Road onto Balfe Road and then turned left onto Walkinstown Road, right into Walkinstown Drive and then on into Walkinstown Green. The driver of the Subaru then dropped the gunman off at a cut-through to the Long Mile Road, and the gunman escaped on foot up the Long Mile Road. The driver of the Subaru abandoned the car at Kilnamanagh Court at around 6.45 p.m., and left on foot. A short distance away, the driver was confronted by a local man who asked him what he was up to. He ran back to the Subaru and drove onto the Long Mile Road, turned right onto Walkinstown Avenue and onto Camac Park, where he burnt the car out. The driver of the Subaru was captured on CCTV footage. The images of the driver were grainy, but Gardaí believe that the driver was a nineteen-year-old from Tallaght who had links to the Thompson gang. Ironically, he was well known to Gary Bryan. On 3 October 2006, Gardaí featured Gary Bryan's murder on RTÉ's
Crimecall
programme in the hope that members of the general public would provide them with information that might lead to a breakthrough. The programme led to a number of promising leads. The nineteen-year-old was known as a hothead who had previous convictions for violence against Gardaí and had once rammed a patrol car off the road. He was detained on 1 November 2006, and again refused to co-operate with Gardaí. He also refused to take part in an identity parade, so Gardaí had no choice but to let him go.

On the same day that the nineteen-year-old was detained, Gardaí also swooped on Liam Brannigan and his girlfriend. Detective Sergeant Barry Butler arrested the twenty-two-year-old woman from Dublin 8, under Section 30 of the Offences Against the State Act. She was questioned at Crumlin Garda Station and made no reply to the majority of questions put to her. She did say that she was with friends from 5.30 p.m. on the day that Gary Bryan was murdered, and went to a party in Drimnagh with them. The woman was arrested because she was the registered owner of the 01 D Fiat Punto that was seen by six witnesses at the murder scene leaving in convoy with the Subaru. The woman acknowledged that she owned the Punto, but said she hadn't used it since June or July 2006. She was six months pregnant when she stopped driving the car. The car had previously been stopped by Gardaí on 8 February 2006. A man, who was involved in the Thompson gang, was driving. When he was stopped at Robert Street, he named Liam Brannigan's girlfriend as its owner. Liam Brannigan was stopped at Francis Street, on 27 May 2006, driving the Punto, and he also told Gardaí that his girlfriend was the owner. Despite the fact that Gardaí had found the car abandoned in Templeogue after Gary Bryan's murder, it was never reported lost or stolen by the woman. She was released without charge.

Liam Brannigan was arrested at Crumlin Road and taken to Sundrive Road Garda Station. His house, at Bride Street in Dublin 8, was also searched, after Denis Donegan issued a warrant. During ten interview sessions, Brannigan refused to answer a single question or sign notes of interview or engage with Gardaí at all. He was detained because witnesses had seen his girlfriend's car leaving the murder scene. The vehicle was insured with Quinn Direct, and the policy recorded its owner as being Liam Brannigan. The car had been recovered by Gardaí but had not been reported lost or stolen, which was very unusual. Brannigan's fingerprint had been found on glass on the back passenger door side, which proved that he had used the car previously. He has also been stopped by Gardaí while driving the Punto on six separate occasions. Brannigan was released without charge.