Gayle Killilea, wife of developer Sean Dunne, has been instructed by a US court to attend the office of bankruptcy trustee Richard Coan to answer questions in her husband's bankruptcy case.

It is the first time that Ms Killilea has been obliged to face examination herself in relation to her husband’s bankruptcy hearing.

In a filing earlier this week, Mr Coan, the court-appointed trustee, sought permission to question Ms Killilea about assets and cash the developer transferred to her.

Mr Coan has cited the repeated failure by Mr Dunne to produce any documents relating to Swiss family law proceedings taken by his wife that form the foundation of a transfer of €44 million to her.

Ms Killilea has already expressed frustration over intrusion by the trustee into her affairs.

Arguing in support of a failed bid by her husband to force the trustee to submit a court-approved set of rules for the management of his bankruptcies in the US and Ireland, a lawyer for Ms Killilea said she had been subjected to wide-ranging and intrusive requests for information and wanted to know her rights.

Eric Henzy told the court earlier this week that one of Mr Dunne's creditors, the National Asset Management Agency, had served seven subpoenas to third parties in relation to her financial affairs, including information from a moving company on possessions belonging to her and her children.

Ms Killilea will now have to answer similar questions herself after a Connecticut bankruptcy court ruled yesterday that Mr Coan may examine her at his firm’s office in New Haven on June 8th – or another time as agreed by the two sides – after Judge Alan Schiff said there was “good cause” for granting the Rule 2004 examination

The questioning of Ms Killilea will take place in private.