‘TERRORISED’ | 

Woman bombarded with death threats by jailed ‘Gucci gang’ thug fears his release

“He is going to come after me when he gets out, I know he is”

Today at 21:22

A woman threatened with death by jailed ‘Gucci gang’ thug Martin Cunningham as he bombarded her with calls from his prison cell has warned: “He’s coming for me when he gets out!”

Gangster Cunningham, who served three years for a machete attack on a rival mobster outside Finglas Garda Station, hounded the woman with more than 3,800 calls from inside Mountjoy.

The young mum-of-one also today reveals how he left her voicemails warning she would be “cut up on her way to work” and would “get a bullet in the back of the head.”

On Wednesday, Cunningham was sentenced to three years in prison for stalking and harassing the woman and for making threats to kill but, with time served, he will be back on the streets early next year.

“He is going to come after me when he gets out, I know he is,” the woman – who spoke with us at an undisclosed location outside the capital – told the Sunday World.

“That’s the truth, he is coming for me. But I’m not scared of him anymore. I’ve hidden for too long. I was afraid for too long. I always said my truth would come out, and it is going to come out.

“I’ve a G.I.M (an official Garda message warning of a threat to a person’s life) on my head from him.

“But I’ve had enough.”

The woman said jailed Cunningham began bombarding her with calls in December of 2020,

“I was in a relationship with him from 2011 to 2019,” she said.

“It ended on bad terms when he done (sic) the machete attack.”

Cunningham had carried out the machete attack on rival drug gang member Kenneth Fitzsimons on April 10, 2019.

He inflicted deep wounds to Fitzsimon’s neck, arms, legs and caused lacerations to his torso that exposed his ribs on both sides.

Such was the severity of Fitzsimon’s injuries, he required four litres of blood during emergency treatment before being sent for surgery.

The assault was one of more than 70 incidents, including arson and firearms offences, arising out of a feud between criminal gangs in Blanchardstown and Finglas.

Cunningham was sentenced to three years for the attack.

“When he went to prison for that, I thought it was finally over and that I could move on,” the woman continued.

“Instead, I got terrorised. Because, I wouldn’t go in to see him or get back with him or answer the phone, he got really possessive and obsessive. And the longer it went on, the more vicious it got.

At his sentencing this week, the court heard how on one occasion the woman was in a bedroom at home when she heard a noiseoutside.

When she looked out, she saw a man smashing the windows of her mother’s car with a metal bar.

The woman believes Cunningham was behind the offence.

Prosecuting Garda Quin Hanley explained to the court that the woman had her phone set up to prevent any calls from private or blocked numbers.

If someone called from a private or blocked number, the phone would not ring but would show it as a missed call.

Garda Hanley said the woman woke up on January 1, 2021, to 176 missed calls and one voicemail.

On March 16, 2021, she received 161 missed calls and a voicemail which said, “I’m getting sick of you making a fool out of me. You better start answering your phone”.

And on March 19, 2021, she received 323 missed calls and four voicemails.

Cunningham said in the voicemails: “You have 10 minutes to answer your phone, or it’s your sister’s house.” He also said, “I swear to God, I’m getting you.”

In total, she received in the region of 3,800 phone calls from Cunningham over the three-month period.

The woman changed her phone number on March 25, 2021.

And several days later, a phone call was received at her place of work warning: “if she is still working there by Friday, there will be a car going through the shop window”.

The woman said both her employer and her mum had contacted the prison about the calls.

“The prison took my name and number off the prison phone but it made absolutely no difference because he had a mobile in the prison,” she said.

“The prison didn’t do enough. They kept him on the landing. If they had put him on 24-hour lock-up, he wouldn’t have been able to continue doing it.”

The woman said Cunningham’s non-stop harassment turned her life into a ‘living hell.’

“There was one message saying: ‘Watch, I’m going to get a bullet put in the back of your head,’ she said.

“There was another one saying: “You’ll see now, I’m going to get you cut up when you’re going to work. Watch out when you’re going to work. You dirty tramp … You slut.’

“The last voicemail I got from him said: ‘When I’m done with you, I’m going to leave you swinging from a rope.’

“I suffered very badly with my mental health over it …. Very badly.

“Because I knew he had the capability to do it. And I knew I was being watched because he knew things that were happening to me.

“I broke my fingers in work and he knew I broke them and was able to tell me I was in hospital. He had people on me.”

The woman said the stalking and harassment left her with no choice but to leave Blanchardstown.

“I went to the guards and, when I told them what he was doing, they were shocked,” she said.

“I couldn’t even go down to the garda station in Blanchardstown to meet them.

“I had to meet them somewhere else because of how severe the threat was that was hanging over me.

““I had a lot of proof because I had everything saved. But I had to give them permission to go in and get my phone records and all the details.

“They did a year’s investigation on it. They told me to keep my head down and to not be afraid anymore.

“That’s easier said than done but they stuck to their word.

“In August of 2021, he was taken out of Mountjoy Prison to be questioned.

“Then they charged him in May 2022 and kept him on remand until he was sentenced this week.”

Assessing the severity of Cunningham’s crimes, sentencing judge Orla Crowe said he had engaged in a “callous, calculating, cruel and sustained” course of harassment against his former partner.​

“Even in court this week, he was still blaming me for what he’s done,” Cunningham’s victim told us.

“I’m so angry about that. I had to leave my home, my family and a job I worked in for so long.

“I have no support unit where I’m living now. But I am starting over again … for me and my child.”