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Ex of Kinahan cartel weapons man wants free legal aid in her battle with CAB

Lisa O’Hara and James Walsh are named in the case in which CAB want a house at Wheatfield Avenue house in Clondalkin declared the proceeds of crime.

Today at 09:04

THE ex-partner of a man caught red-handed with a Kinahan Cartel weapons stash is to seek free legal aid in a case brought by the Criminal Assets Bureau.

Lisa O’Hara and James Walsh are named in the case in which CAB want a house at Wheatfield Avenue house in Clondalkin declared the proceeds of crime.

Her defence lawyer was told by Judge Alex Owens that a hearing for a free legal aid application will now go ahead on 20 March.

Last November CAB were set to allow the sale of the former couple’s home to go ahead, and the money be held by a solicitor

But then in December it emerged the planned €340,000 sale fell through, and Judge Alex Owens agreed to revert to the previous interim order to prevent the property being sold.

The house was the scene of garda searches in 2017 following a raid at Greenogue Business Park, Rathcoole as gardaí acted on information from their British colleagues investigating Thomas ‘Bomber’ Kavanagh’s drugs gang.

Walsh, who was not represented in court this week, was previously convicted of his role in a weapons stash organised by Bomber Kavanagh in 2016.

Also convicted over the lethal underworld armoury was key Cartel man Declan Brady aka Mr Nobody and Jonathan ‘Rocket Man’ Harding.

Walsh also pleaded guilty in July 2021 at the non-jury Special Criminal Court to laundering €62,000 in crime cash.

Walsh (39) and his former partner Lisa O’Hara had both been charged with a total of 44 money laundering offences, which include using crime cash for a deposit on a house.

He was also charged with stashing €19,000 in a wardrobe at his home.

O’Hara given a suspended sentence, after pleading guilty to multiple counts of laundering more than €100,000 that was the proceeds of crime.

The Special Criminal Court found that she didn’t know where the money came from but was reckless in not asking questions of her then partner and father of her child.

When the gardaí had raided their home they also found financial documents which showed €136,000 had been lodged in various bank and credit union accounts over a three-year period,

It included a €60,000 cash deposit on the house and another €62,000 in cash paid to a builder for renovations on the house.

Walsh, was serving an eight-year sentence for the weapons offences when he was given another sentence of four years and nine months for money laundering.

O’Hara, who had never been in trouble before, said she presumed Walsh worked every day like she did.

The raid at Greenogue Business Park in Rathcoole came at the height of the Hutch-Kinahan feud in January 2017.

Walsh was standing in the reception area of the industrial unit where gardaí found 15 firearms, including an AK47, and 1,300 rounds of ammunition.