Cocaine Wars

by Mick McCaffrey

  Of the independent witnesses present, many gave detailed statements that helped Gardaí to build up a picture of what happened. A security guard said he saw four men in a ‘silver Nissan small two-door car’ pull up outside the premises. He then saw the front-seat passenger put on a black balaclava and get out of the car with a knife in his hand. ‘Before he [Declan Gavin] got a chance to do anything, the man with the knife lashed out at him.’ He then described how Gavin initially struggled to get into Abrakebabra, and also described how a man with a golf club chased the knife-man after the stabbing occurred, while others threw missiles at the escaping Nissan car.

  None of the Abrakebabra staff were able to help Gardaí to identify the killer, because he had been wearing a balaclava. Another witness described how he saw the silver Nissan pull up, and heard the front-seat passenger shout ‘rat’ at a man standing in a crowd. The passenger, who was wearing a balaclava, then jumped out while carrying a knife in his right hand. He stabbed the man he had called a ‘rat’ seconds earlier, and the knife made contact with him somewhere in the chest area. He saw the injured man run into Abrakebabra, leaving a trail of blood behind him, while the knife-man followed him. He then said that the knife-man was unable to get into the restaurant. He also described how a bystander attacked the Nissan with a golf club, and he was of the opinion that several of the bystanders knew the identity of the attacker, although he did not.

  David Byrne, who was Declan Gavin’s close friend and a member of his gang, gave a statement to Gardaí in which he detailed how he was in the area around Crumlin Shopping Centre with four friends. The group arrived at Abrakebabra at around 3.20 a.m., and he had a short conversation with Declan Gavin. Shortly after this, he turned and saw Gavin being chased into Abrakebabra by a man with a balaclava who was carrying a silver knife. When the knife-man was unable to get into the ‘chipper’, he kicked the door and then turned and went towards the parked Nissan. Byrne then ran into Abrakebabra to see if Gavin was all right. He was later able to identify himself from CCTV stills shown to him by Gardaí.

  Mark Skerritt and three of his friends had spent the night of the murder in the Vatican nightclub in Harcourt Street. Then one of them drove the group of four to Abrakebabra at about 3.00 a.m. Skerritt was involved on the periphery of the row that Declan Gavin had broken up, although there were no cross words exchanged between the two men. Skerritt was around Abrakebabra when the Nissan Micra pulled up, and he heard the front-seat passenger shout out: ‘Deco, ye rat. You’re dead.’ He then saw the passenger pull on a balaclava and get out of the car with a ‘big butcher’s knife’ in his hand. Skerritt later told Gardaí that a passenger in the back of the Micra pointed out Declan Gavin to the knife-man, saying: ‘There he is over there’, before saying, ‘Get the rat.’ Skerritt remembered the knife-man approaching Gavin and saying: ‘Deco, it’s me’, or, ‘Deco, do you remember me?’ before stabbing him in the chest. Mark Skerritt was close by his friend’s car when the assault occurred; he went to the boot and got a golf club. He then chased the knife-man, who by now was running back to the Micra. Skerritt then swung at the knifeman, hitting him on the back. The knife-man managed to get into the getaway car, and Skerritt hit the car with the golf club, before the vehicle left the scene. Mark Skerritt stated that he knew who the knife-man was, but he was not prepared to identify him, for fear of a revenge attack being carried out on him.

  Detectives interviewed Declan Gavin’s friend Eamon Daly, and he told them about Gavin’s movements on the night of the murder. After the twenty-first birthday party in the Transport Club, they headed into town but then separated, with each going to a different nightclub. They arranged to meet up again at Abrakebabra. Before the stabbing incident, Daly saw Gavin outside ‘kissing a bird’, but she had left the scene before the Nissan Micra arrived.

  Daly remembered a car pulling up outside Abrakebabra with at least three people in it. He said that a man got out of the front passenger door wearing a balaclava and carrying a knife. ‘He was roaring and shouting like he was psyching himself up’ was how Daly described him. After the stabbing occurred, Andrew Murray gave Daly a lift to nearby Dolphin’s Barn Fire Station to get an ambulance. While they were on the way to the station, they were pulled over by Gardaí. The Gardaí had heard about the murder and thought that the pair speeding down the road might have been escaping the murder scene. They soon discovered that Daly and Murray were simply trying to get help for their dying friend.

  Gardaí eventually found out that the man who carried out the murder had been talking to John Malone before the incident, but they did not know this when they interviewed the twenty-one-year-old in the hours after of the killing. Malone was undergoing basic training at Cathal Brugha army barracks. He was living in Saggart but was originally from Drimnagh. He made a statement describing how he and a group of friends arrived at Abrakebabra after 3.00 a.m., where they saw Declan Gavin ‘talking to a girl’. They were at the steps outside the Irish Permanent, which was next door to the restaurant. He said he saw a ‘silvery coloured Micra’, and that the driver of the car ‘said something to me’. He then observed a man in the front passenger seat wearing a balaclava and carrying a knife, while there were ‘two or three in the back. I didn’t get a good look at them.’ Malone then stated that the knife-man chased Declan Gavin to Abrakebabra, before pushing the door open enough to get his arm in and swing at Gavin with the knife.

  On 29 August, Malone was interviewed again but was not detained. He elaborated on his first statement, saying he ‘knew two or three people in the car’, and said a number of those in the car were saying: ‘Where is he? Where is he?’ ‘I knew these people were looking for Declan Gavin as they had been fighting with him for years.’ He stated that he knew the knife-man, the driver and one of the rear-seat passengers, but he refused to name them and said, ‘I am afraid for my family’s lives, that they would be in danger.’

  When interviewed by Gardaí on the morning after the murder, Justin Beatty, from Tallaght, said that he had taken ecstasy and three or four lines of cocaine at the Castle nightclub in Finglas, so he was ‘off his head’ when he arrived with his mates at Abrakebabra. He said he did not see the stabbing because he had been relieving himself at the time, but heard screaming and a woman saying: ‘He has a knife’, and saw people running. After that he saw the Nissan Micra speed away from the scene, and he ran into the restaurant to see what had happened. He could not get into the kitchen because the manager closed the door on him. He kicked in the door and saw Declan Gavin lying injured on the ground.

  Andrew Murray, a soldier in the Irish Army, was at the Castle nightclub in Finglas with Justin Beatty and three other friends. He initially told Gardaí that he witnessed John Malone talking to the occupants of the Nissan Micra before the knife-man got out. ‘I saw this guy stab Declan Gavin with the knife. This stabbing happened on the steps leading down to Abrakebabra.’ He stated that he and John Malone discussed the stabbing on their way home, and the culprits mentioned were Joey Redmond and Rattigan. He would not put this in his statement, as he was afraid of retribution. In a further statement, three days after the murder, he went on to say that when the Micra arrived, ‘A tall fella who I think was Joey Redmond got out of this Nissan Micra. I know Joey Redmond to see and I know he is friendly with the Rattigans.’ In two unsigned memorandums of interview, Andrew Murray said that he recognised three of the people involved in the stabbing, but did not want to name them because he was ‘not a rat’. He then went on to name Brian Rattigan, Joey Redmond and Shane Maloney. He said that Brian Rattigan stabbed Gavin, but he would not sign anything with the names of the three men on it because he was afraid.

  Several witnesses described the girl who spoke to Gavin just seconds before the murder as having spoken to the occupants of the Micra just before the stabbing. In her original interview on the day after the murder, she recalled chatting to Declan Gavin at the restaurant. She described the Micra pulling up and a passenger shouting ‘rats’ out the window.
‘I said: “What are ye saying?” as I walked by’, she confirmed. She didn’t see the actual stabbing but did see Mark Skerritt chase the knife-man with a golf club. She later said that Skerritt had given her the handle of the broken golf club, which she threw away.

  Darren Geoghegan and Patrick Doyle were good friends and criminal associates of Declan Gavin. They both arrived at Abrakebabra just after the stabbing and did not witness anything at all. When they heard that their mate had been stabbed and was in a bad way, they rushed into the restaurant. They saw Gavin lying on the kitchen floor, surrounded by two women who were giving him first aid. Geoghegan initially refused to co-operate with Gardaí and give a statement. He was later interviewed in Cloverhill Prison after being sent there on remand for a road traffic offence, and then again at Sundrive Road Garda Station, after he was taken out of prison for questioning. He remembered arriving at the scene just before the Gardaí. He followed the ambulance in his car to St James’s Hospital, and rang Gavin’s mother, Pauline, to tell her what had happened. It was Pauline Gavin who later told Geoghegan that her son had passed away.

  Patrick Doyle was interviewed at Ronanstown Garda Station after being arrested under Section 30 of the Offences Against the State Act for possession of a firearm. During his interview, Doyle confirmed that it was his belief that Brian Rattigan was behind the stabbing. He also volunteered to Gardaí that Shane Maloney was around when it happened. Doyle did point out that he was not there, though, and everything he had heard was second-hand from different people.

  After interviewing the known witnesses at at Abrakebabra, Gardaí had built up a detailed picture of what had happened there, but they knew that some people had not told half of what they knew. So it was decided that those people would be arrested at later dates.

  After finding Brian Rattigan’s finger and palm print on the door of Abrakebabra, Gardaí had enough to arrest him and question him about the murder. On 28 August, Detective Sergeant Joe O’Hara and other Gardaí called to Rattigan’s home on Cooley Road looking for him. He had been staying at a safe house since the murder, and was not at home when Gardaí searched the house to see if they could find anything to link him to the murder. Gardaí received information that he would be attending Dublin District Court on 4 September 2001. So two officers waited there to arrest him. When Rattigan saw uniformed Garda Paul Lynch and another member, he fled on foot. Sharon Rattigan and Shay O’Byrne were with Rattigan and physically blocked the Gardaí from arresting him. The pair were then arrested and charged with obstruction under Section 19 of the Public Order Act. Later that day Gardaí received information that Brian Rattigan was drinking in a pub on James’s Street in Dublin 8. Joe O’Hara arrested Rattigan on suspicion of Declan Gavin’s murder, and he was taken to Sundrive Road Garda Station, where he was photographed and fingerprinted.

  Detective Sergeants Peter O’Boyle and Joe O’Hara took Rattigan into the interview room. After being cautioned about his rights and speaking privately with his solicitor, the interview commenced. Rattigan told the detectives that he did nothing wrong, and that he used to eat in Abrakebabra but was not there on the night of the murder. He claimed that he was with a married woman at the time, but would not name her because he did not want her husband to find out. He refused to take part in an identity parade. He then quoted the Bob Dylan song ‘Hurricane’ about the black boxer Ruben Carter, who was wrongly convicted of murder in 1967 in New Jersey. The two hours of interview did not yield much, and Joe O’Hara and Peter O’Boyle took a break. They were replaced by Detective Inspector Dominic Hayes and Detective Garda Marcus De Long from the National Bureau of Criminal Investigation, a specialist unit that investigates serious crime and murders. Rattigan told the two officers that he couldn’t remember where he was when the murder happened, and then said that he was with a married woman but would not name her.

  He then changed his story and said he was at his brother’s eighteenth birthday party for the whole night and never left it. He swore that he hadn’t been near Abrakebabra for months. He was supremely confident throughout the period of questioning, until he was told that Gardaí had recovered his palm print from the window of the restaurant, and it was in Declan Gavin’s blood. The colour drained from Rattigan’s face at this point, and he quietly said that if this was the case then ‘it’s all over’. The interview concluded shortly afterwards. Then Then Rattigan was visited by Dr James Maloney, in the presence of DS Joe O’Hara. He was asked for his consent to provide a blood sample but he refused. He agreed to be examined by the doctor in private, and Joe O’Hara took this time to speak with Detective Superintendent Denis Donegan, who authorised that a sample be taken from the prisoner under Section 2 (4) (a) of the Criminal Justice (Forensic Act) 1990. Rattigan again refused to comply. He then consulted privately with his solicitor by telephone, and was again asked for a sample, and again he refused.

  He was returned to his cell without having given blood, and was given food and tea. He was then visited by an aunt for ten minutes. Around 9.00 p.m. Denis Donegan extended the period of Rattigan’s detention, and he was taken back into the interview room. DS Joe O’Hara and DG Eamonn Maloney interviewed him for a period of nearly three hours. During this interview, Rattigan repeatedly said that he ‘did not do anything wrong’, and was definitely not in Abrakebabra on the night of the murder. He again refused to take part in an ID parade and said that Gardaí had planted his fingerprint. Again, he used the Ruben Carter example. When he was told that there were several witnesses who placed him at the murder scene, he said that when it came to the crunch they ‘will never say it’. He smiled at the Gardaí and told them to ‘Prove it, that’s your job.’ At around midnight Dominic Hayes and Marcus De Long took over. Rattigan again declined to give a blood sample, but he did hand over a strand of hair voluntarily. He said he would wait to see what was in the book of evidence. This interview concluded at around 1.15 a.m., and about an hour later Joe O’Hara and Eamonn Maloney tried again. Rattigan was at his most talkative during this interview. He told the detectives that ‘rats’ must have given them their information. He told them that he ‘guaranteed’ that he would not be charged with the murder and said that Gardaí would be going around in bulletproof vests because: ‘There will be another one. If I get done tomorrow one of them will get it, that’s the way it is.’ After being given a cup of tea, he was asked about his opinion of Declan Gavin. He said that his former friend was a ‘rat who got caught’ and had ‘loads of tax and insurance’ offences but he didn’t do any time. The interview finished with Rattigan saying that if any witness said they saw him at the scene they ‘will be naming the wrong person’. The interview was completed around 3.00 a.m. Later Rattigan was released on the murder charge, but he was charged in relation to an existing bench warrant for his arrest. He was put into custody in the Bridewell Garda Station, and was given bail the following afternoon after a court appearance.

  At the same time that Gardaí were searching Brian Rattigan’s family home on Cooley Road, a different search team called to Joey Redmond’s house, just a few minutes away from Rattigan’s. Nobody was present when the Gardaí called, so a team, led by Peter O’Boyle, forced their way in, but nothing of evidential value was found. On 7 September, Joey Redmond called to Sundrive Road Garda Station and told the Garda on front desk duty that he wished to speak to a member of the Declan Gavin murder investigation team.

  Accompanied by Detective Garda Eamon O’Loughlin, Joe O’Hara invited Joey Redmond into an interview room. He explained to him that he was not under arrest and was free to leave at any time. The two detectives obviously thought that Joey Redmond was there to talk about the murder a couple of weeks earlier, but when he sat down, Redmond wanted to know why Gardaí ‘went up to me house and smashed the window for nothing’. He then said that he had nothing else to say to them and refused to sign the memorandum of interview. With that, he sauntered out of the station. The following afternoon, Joe O’Hara spotted Joey Redmond on the Crumlin Road, just yards fro
m the Garda station, and arrested him on suspicion of murder. He was taken to the station and searched, and was found to have two documents in his possession. The first was a note from a doctor stating that he had examined Joey Rattigan on 7 September and found no evidence of external injury to his body. The second document was a note from a solicitor, signed by Redmond and dated 7 September, stating that he was innocent of any involvement in Declan Gavin’s death and ‘did nothing wrong’. When Joey Rattigan was first interviewed, he remained silent for long periods and said that he just came to the station to see why Gardaí had searched his mother’s house. During his second interview, he maintained that he had nothing to do with Declan Gavin’s death and said he was not at Abrakebabra on the night of the murder, and that whoever told this to Gardaí was lying. He refused to give a blood sample, but said he would think about taking part in an identification parade. He then said that witnesses would not pick him out ‘because I wasn’t there the night he was killed’. After being interviewed on the second occasion, Joey Redmond refused to see a doctor to be medically examined, and consulted with his solicitor. His period of detention was extended and he was photographed and fingerprinted. He was interviewed for the third time by Detective Gardaí Eamon O’Loughlin and Ronan Lafferty. He told the officers that he was with a few mates on the night of the murder but refused to name them. When he was told that people in Abrakebabra had named him as being there, he said they were drunk and mistaken. He confirmed that an ex-girlfriend of Shane Maloney owned a 93 D silver Nissan Micra, but other than that not much progress was made, so the interview concluded around midnight. Joey Redmond then spoke to his sister on the telephone. Before being placed in a cell for the night, he was asked to remove his runners, which is common practice to make sure that prisoners do not attempt suicide. He pleaded with the two detectives that his runners were ‘only new’ and he would be ‘freezing’ without them. So Gardaí let him keep them on overnight. The following morning, before being released, Redmond was interviewed one more time. A number of witness statements placing him outside Abrakebabra were read to him, but he said the people ‘must have been drunk’. He continued, saying that he did nothing wrong and goaded Gardaí by saying, ‘Why don’t you just charge me and I’ll take my chances in court? Prove it.’ At around 10.30 a.m. Joey Redmond was released without charge, was re-arrested and then charged with an unrelated previous offence. He was taken straight to Dublin District Court, where he was given bail soon after.