If Jonathan Dowdall’s political career had a high point, it was May 23rd, 2014 when he came fourth out of 19 candidates running in the inner city for a seat on Dublin City Council.
As a fresh-faced 36-year-old with a highly successful business, Dowdall was an inner-city success story whose star was on the rise in Sinn Féin.
Within three years, Dowdall had lost his business, his council seat and his freedom while his former party was doing everything it could to disavow him. Five years later and Dowdall is again facing into a lengthy prison sentence and a life of looking over his shoulder following his commitment to giving evidence against the alleged perpetrators of the Regency Hotel attack.
Born in 1978 in the North Inner City, Dowdall came from a respected family which had no involvement in crime. When he was 15-years-old he got to know his neighbour Patrick “Patsy” Hutch, the brother of Gerry Hutch.
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Over the following years the Dowdalls would occasionally get loans from the Hutch family. Once Jonathan graduated from DIT and set up his own business, he also got occasional loans from the Hutches to meet payroll.
From its inception in 2007, Dowdall’s company Abco Electrical went from strength to strength, even as other businesses went to the wall during the recession. By 2014, he employed 12 electricians and did business around the country. He also bought a house on the Navan Road which was fitted with security gates, multiple CCTV cameras and a large fish tank.
Abco boasted contracts with the HSE, Dublin Airport Authority and the National Museum in Collins Barracks in Dublin. Much of its work involved installing security and alarm systems, including CCTV systems.
One of Dowdall’s smaller jobs was wiring the home of a prominent Sinn Féin figure. This brought him to the attention of senior party figures.
One of those, Mary Lou McDonald, saw Dowdall as the ideal candidate for the party in the upcoming 2014 local election. He had few political instincts and no family connections to republican politics. But he was well known in the local community, including as a provider of apprenticeships to young men. Dowdall’s white BMW and high-end motorbikes were regular sights in the area.
He was a late addition to the Sinn Féin ticket and it is almost certain his selection cost another Sinn Féin candidate, Gaye Fagan, a seat. This was a cause of resentment for some in the party as Fagan was a well-established figure in community activism at the time.
Despite the party’s high hopes for Dowdall, he made a lacklustre impression during his brief stint on the Council.
One councillor who served at the same time described him as a “bobblehead”, someone who constantly nodded along but rarely said anything. “There wasn’t a whole pile to him. He came out of nowhere in the 2014 local election and disappeared just as quickly.”
Council records show he sat on several committees, including the Central Area Joint Policing Committee and the North Inner City Drugs and Alcohol Task Force, but that his involvement was limited.
Among the motions he put forward was for gardaí to tackle antisocial behaviour in the Centra shop on Mountjoy Street and for the council to provide wifi in north Dublin senior citizens facilities. He also pushed for the Garth Brooks concerts to be allowed to go ahead in Croke Park.
After nine months on the council, Dowdall claimed he was being bullied by some in Sinn Féin. He quit the party and gave up his council seat. Gaye Fagan was co-opted into the position.
Shortly afterwards, Dowdall gave up control of his company, transferring it to his wife and another family member, company records show.
This is where things truly started to unravel for Dowdall. In March 2016, shortly after the Regency Hotel shooting, armed gardaí raided his house and seized documents, electronics and his prized BMW. Officers from the Garda Water Unit were even brought into to search the fish tank.
On a USB drive taken from the house, gardaí found a January 2015 video of Dowdall and his father waterboarding and threatening a man who they accused of trying to scam them. This led to both men receiving lengthy jail terms for kidnapping and assault in 2017.
That sentence concluded last April. In two weeks Dowdall will begin another four-year term for his role in the Regency attack followed by a life in exile.
