May.27, 2010

FORENSIC accountants from seven countries were working closely together last night to help build up a money laundering case against international drugs wholesaler Christy Kinahan and his criminal associates.

They are putting together a case to secure court approval for the seizure of a worldwide assets portfolio that is being conservatively estimated at €200m.

Meanwhile, Spanish police said yesterday they were investigating whether some of the members of the gang were linked to a string of unsolved murders on the Costa del Sol.

Much of the money netted from Kinahan's vast drug trafficking empire has been invested in property.

But the financial value of the portfolio is reckoned to have been at least halved because of the global recession.

Detectives from the Garda national drugs unit, which acted as the lead agency in the two-year operation, codenamed Shovel, have completed 55 searches here.

They have seized documentation showing that money held by some of Kinahan's associates based in Dublin was invested and laundered through a number of businesses, including a chain of dry-cleaning outlets in the capital.

Gardai believe that a hairdressing and beauty salon was also used to launder the money while the extent of a betting racket, which has so far been shown to have "cleaned" €2.5m, has yet to be fully determined.

Police in Spain are focusing on 60 luxury properties, mostly located on the Costa del Sol, while six tourist complexes and upmarket villas are under the spotlight in Brazil, according to investigating officers.

Kinahan (53) was one of 20 people detained in Spain along with nine other Irish suspects, including his reputed right- hand man, John Cunningham.

Two of the Irish suspects are also being questioned about the discovery of a firearm during the 47 searches there on homes and businesses.

Eleven suspects arrested in the UK have all been released on police bail while the 23-year-old man detained by gardai in Dublin's north inner city has been released from Store Street garda station.

Senior garda officers have not ruled out further searches and arrests but at the moment they are concentrating on the huge volumes of documentation and financial records.

They are focusing in particular on reputable business figures, who may have been involved, possibly unwittingly, in helping the money laundering end of the criminal business.

Meanwhile, Spanish police said yesterday they were investigating whether some of the members of the gang were linked to a string of unsolved murders on the Costa del Sol.

Possible link

Officers revealed they were looking at a possible connection to the killing of three Irishmen and an attempt to murder a Dublin criminal, who had moved there some years ago.

Police had already confirmed they were checking out the files on the gangland-style execution of Dubliner Paddy Doyle in February 2008 in Cancelada, near Estepona.

But they are now holding fresh inquiries into the shooting of drugs trafficker Richard Keogh in February 2009, the death of an Irishman whose remains were found on waste ground in Mijas Costa in July 2009 and the attempted "hit" on Peter "Fatso" Mitchell in October 2008.

Mitchell (39), a former henchman of jailed crime boss, John Gilligan, was shot in the shoulder when a gunman opened fire in a packed bar in upmarket Puerto Banus, near Marbella.

Father-of-four Keogh, originally from Cabra in Dublin, was gunned down opposite a casino, half an hour's drive east in Torrequebrada, near the tourist resort of Benalmadena. He tried to escape after being shot at twice but fell injured outside a supermarket before being killed at close range by the gunman.

Spanish police also confiscated dozens of forged blank Irish and British passports as well as €100,000 in cash and in the house they found 51 mobile phones.

More than two dozen top-of- the-range cars were taken to a compound at Malaga port.

Several of the vehicles were removed from an underground car park at an upmarket apartment block, near Estepona.

Officers examining Kinahan's lavish lifestyle found a yellow Lamborghini, which cost €181,000 and consumed petrol at a rate of 14 miles to the gallon, and a red Corvette.