Whacker Duffy and Dessie O'Hare lead extortion campaign in city
Notorious INLA terrorists Declan 'Whacker' Duffy and Dessie 'the Border Fox' O'Hare have received sanction by senior dissident bosses in the North to run a massive extortion and protection money campaign in Dublin.
Duffy, O'Hare and their cronies have established a lucrative criminal enterprise as the economy here improves.
Sources say that the fact that the two killers have been "operating with such clout" in recent weeks has led to tension with other INLA gangsters - including a criminal from Kimmage in south Dublin, who is suspected of involvement in the murder of Traveller burglary boss 'Fat Andy' Connors last year.
The Kimmage-based thug has previously served a sentence for membership of an illegal organisation, after he was busted when armed detectives raided a bomb making factory.
Sources say that he was considered the leader of the feared terror group in Dublin until a "new cash drive" started with Duffy (41) and O'Hare (57), stepping up their activities.
"The younger man is not impressed at all with what is going on and he is feeling very left out. This could have serious consequences in the future," a source explained.
"For the first time since the crash there is lots of money around - and where there is money, there are vultures."
Separately it was reported at the weekend that O'Hare is being investigated as part of a €2m fraud probe.
Gardai are investigating whether he has been offering bogus outsourcing of financial services to hotels in Dublin.
In April, the Herald revealed that gardai were looking to speak to Duffy after a Mercedes car owned by a 68-year-old businessman was burnt out by associates of the gangland thug in the Glasnevin area of the capital.
Originally from Armagh, Duffy is now spending a lot of time in Dublin's south inner city.
He joined the INLA in the 1980s and was still a teenager when he was involved in the murder of Sergeant Michael Newman in Derby, England, in 1992.
It was not until July 2010 that he was convicted and received a life sentence for the murder of the unarmed police officer, who was shot once through the side of the head at point-blank range as he reached his car.
Duffy had served jail time here for membership of the INLA as well as for his role in the infamous Ballymount Bloodbath.
In 1999 his group took six men from a rival gang hostage and beat and tortured them in Ballymount industrial estate.
During a bitter fight, INLA man Patrick Campbell was killed by machete blows.
Duffy served nine years in prison for false imprisonment and possession of a gun.
He was released in 2007, but immediately became involved in a bitter gangland feud with dangerous criminals based in the south inner city, Crumlin and Tallaght areas of the capital, before being arrested and convicted of membership of an illegal organisation in 2008.
One of those thugs was gang boss 'Fat' Freddie Thompson, who is due to be released from jail in the coming weeks.
Like Duffy, O' Hare was also released under the Good Friday Agreement after being given a 40-year sentence for kidnapping and mutilating Dublin dentist John O'Grady in 1987 and was linked to multiple murders during the Troubles.
Gardai rescued Dr O'Grady, but O'Hare escaped. He was eventually caught after a shoot-out in Co Kilkenny.
O'Hare previously claimed that he had reformed, taken up yoga and attended the Glencree Centre for Reconciliation in Co Wicklow.
Specialist garda units are understood to be keeping both men under regular surveillance.
Last month it emerged that the duo were among a group of men involved in two separate, serious incidents in the Citywest area, in which a businessman was kidnapped and a security employee was the victim of a savage assault.