A lawyer for Liam Byrne (43), a leading member of the Kinahan organised crime group who has pleaded guilty to weapons charges in Britain, has urged a judge at the Old Bailey in London to be lenient with his client, whom he said intended to lead “a good and honest life when he is released”.
Byrne, originally from Crumlin in Dublin, and his fellow Dubliner and brother-in-law Thomas “Bomber” Kavanagh (57), will learn their sentences on Tuesday after admitting to orchestrating a ruse to secure a lighter sentence for Kavanagh in a separate drugs case.
At a sentencing hearing on Monday for the two Dubliners and Shaun Kent (38) from Liverpool, who had also admitted his role in the plot, the Old Bailey heard that Kavanagh masterminded the scheme from prison in Britain. All three have admitted weapons charges, while Kavanagh also admitted perverting the course of justice.
Kavanagh directed Byrne, Kent and others in 2020 to procure firearms, which the gang buried in a field near Newry in Co Down. Kavanagh, then in custody in Britain and facing a heavy sentence for cocaine and cannabis trafficking, pretended to be an informant.
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In 2021 he tipped off Britain’s National Crime Agency (NCA) about the whereabouts of the cache of 11 high-powered guns and ammunition that the gang had amassed for this purpose, in the hope the find would make him appear co-operative and he might get a lesser sentence in his drugs case.
The plot was foiled, however, when French police breached the EncroChat secure messaging service – described in court as “WhatsApp for criminals” – that the gang had used. They then passed the messages to the British police, who withdrew co-operation with Kavanagh.
Prosecutor Tom Forester KC on Monday led the judge, Philip Katz, through some of the 199 pages of EncroChat messages that police had linked to the defendants.
Byrne had used the EncroChat handle Thai Live, while others referred to him by the nickname Gargler. Kent, meanwhile, used the EncroChat handles Firm Cleaner and Marcos Cafu to pass on messages received through an intermediary from Kavanagh behind bars.
Kavanagh was not on EncroChat. However, other members of the gang referred to him on the system using nicknames such as Big Head, Pops, Malla and “our mate”.
Most of the messages were sent around April and May of 2020, when the gang complained Covid lockdowns were disrupting their operations. Kavanagh, described in court as the senior member at the “apex” of the scheme, passed messages to another man in prison, who passed them to Kent, who relayed instructions to the others via EncroChat.
The trail of messages revealed how Kent, Byrne and others tried to procure guns in the Republic, Northern Ireland, the Netherlands and in Manchester. They referred to weapons as “yokes”, “small ones and big ones”, “tools” and “stuff what makes a loud noise”. Ammunition were “sweets”.
Mr Forester said that while Kavanagh directed the plan, Kent and Byrne were “big cogs in the machine”. Other criminals who the gang engaged with in their hunt to build the cache were called Wiggo, Funny, Tabuki and The Jew.
In one message in the spring of 2020, Kent warned of Kavanagh’s growing frustration at the length of time it was taking to assemble the weapons haul. “He will end up cracking heads, mate,” he said.
Referring to the pandemic, he said Kavanagh “wants everything ready once this virus f**ks off”.
At one stage Byrne was directed to speak to “the two Johns”, believed to be members of Kavanagh’s legal team at the time. At one stage, Byrne told another criminal he wanted guns that were free of fingerprints. “Make sure you wipe them good,” Byrne said.
EncroChat was compromised in June 2020, months before Kavanagh approached the NCA. Through his lawyers, he gave officers a map with X marking the spot in a field near Newry. There, officers found 11 guns, including submachine guns and pistols, in holdalls beneath the surface.
But soon afterwards, police arrested the men when the plot was discovered. Kavanagh was subsequently sentenced to 21 years in prison in the drugs case.
Jeremy Dein KC, barrister for Byrne, told the Old Bailey that his client had not been in trouble for “almost a quarter of a century” and had suffered emotional strain recently following the death of his father. Byrne’s brother, David Byrne, was killed in the Regency shooting in Dublin in 2016.
Mr Dein said Liam Byrne was a spray painter, and “never wants to find himself in this position again”. He also said he hadn’t seen two of his children since he had entered Belmarsh prison last summer.
Judge Katz said he would deliver sentencing in the case at 10.30am on Tuesday.
