Four Men to Face Trial for Kidnap and Torture of Irish Businessman

DUBLIN’s Special Criminal Court rules that four men charged with the kidnap and torture of businessman Kevin Lunney will face trial next month.

The four men are accused of abducting Kevin Lunney from his home in September 2019 before savagely torturing him at an isolated farm in the Irish border region. Three of the defendants are aged between 25 and 66, from Dublin’s north inner city and County Cavan. A fourth man cannot be identified in the media ‘for legal reasons’.

Kevin Lunney, the director of Quinn Industrial Holdings (QIH), was driving home from work along the Irish border with the UK when he was assailed by another car. Masked men hauled him into the boot of a Black Audi and drove the terrified father of six to an isolated farm area.

He was told by the gang that he must resign from his position as director of QIH, a company that has been the subject of intimidation since its founder Sean Quinn was forced out of the company in 2016. The multi-million euro building product company holds an important place in Ireland’s complex border region.

Lunney was then savagely tortured, with the men running a Stanley blade under his fingernails and rubbing bleach into deep knife wounds across his body. They carved the initials of his company, QIH, across his chest and warned him that unless he resigned he and his family would be targetted again. ‘We have to rough you up, we have to mark you, we have to make you remember’ they told Lunney, according to the victim.

After his agonising ordeal, the gang dumped the 50-year old executive on a rural backroad in County Cavan, on the republic side of the border, where he was found and rushed to hospital by a local farmer. The four men on trial have alleged that they are the victims of a conspiracy involving fake DNA evidence, which the Special Criminal Court has dismissed as an excuse to delay the high-profile trial.


Thank you for taking the time to read this news article “Four Men to Face Trial for Kidnap and Torture of Irish Businessman”. For more UK daily news, Spanish daily news and Global news stories, visit the Euro Weekly News home page.

Author badge placeholder
Written by

Oisin Sweeney

Oisin is an Irish writer based in Seville, the sunny capital of Andalucia. After starting his working life as a bookseller, he moved into journalism and cut his teeth as a reporter at one of Ireland's biggest news websites. Since joining Euro Weekly News in November, he has enjoyed covering the latest stories from Seville, Spain and further afield - with special interests in crime, cybersecurity, and European politics. Anyone who can pronounce his name first try gets a free cerveza...

Comments