Court move to evict tenants from hotel linked to the IRA
Saturday December 08 2007
THE Sachs Hotel case returns to full hearing in the Four Courts next week, more than a decade after accusations of money laundering and IRA connections ensured the row first hit the headlines.
The owners of the prestigious Morehampton Road property, Crofter Ltd, have been trying to sever links with the hotel's tenants Genport Ltd, since the mid-1990s.
Earlier this year, the courts ruled that while Genport had to pay €1m in rent arrears, the company was entitled to renew its lease on the hotel.
The million euro has since been paid, but Crofter is now asking the big business division of the High Court to over-turn Genport's right to continue to rent the property.
The case begins this Tuesday and is due to last four days, a reasonably long spell by Commercial Court standards.
The original row centred on Crofter's efforts to remove Genport as tenants following IR£690,000 of rent arrears which accumulated between August 1993 and November 1995.
When the case began in late 1995, proceedings were quickly enlivened when Genport's Philip Smyth told the court that phone lines linked to hotel owner Hugh Tunney had been responsible for calls made to the UK authorities alleging that Mr Smyth had been laundering drug money for the IRA through the hotel, with the help of his brother, who was a garda chief superintendent.
The phone call allegation, which was denied by Crofter and Mr Tunney, prompted Genport to seek damages from Crofter and Mr Smyth was given permission to apply to the English court to bring two UK detectives to Ireland to testify about the phone calls.
In 2002, the High Court found that the calls had been made by Hugh Tunney's secretary Caroline Devine, and awarded IR£50,000 in "general damages" to Genport, along with IR£250,000 in exemplary damages.
Those awards were later appealed to the Supreme Court which, in 2005, upheld the IR£50,000 award and replaced the IR£250,000 award with an award for IR£100,000.
- Laura Noonan
