Paul Murphy, one of 11 children, grew up in Seán McDermott Street in Dublin’s north inner city until he was aged 12 after which he was reared by his grandmother.
He left school after primary level and was an Army private for a year before opening a newsagent’s shop. He has a long work history and held several other jobs in shops, pubs, hotels, restaurants and the security industry.
At the time of the Regency attack in 2016, he had worked for many years as a taxi driver, having secured a public service vehicle licence in 1994.
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Now aged 61, and with an address at Cherry Avenue, Swords, Co Dublin, Murphy clocked up several convictions for minor offences, including road traffic, public order and larceny from a young age. Some of these date back 50 years.
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The court heard a Christopher Ryan had changed his name by deed poll to Paul Murphy in 1987 and that, between Ryan/Murphy, there were a number of previous convictions for minor offences.
All of those were dealt with at District Court level and the longest sentence imposed was one of 12 months.
The court heard that Murphy had bought a car from Eddie Hutch, also a taxi driver. Eddie Hutch, who was not involved in crime, became the fifth victim of the feud between the Hutch and Kinahan criminal organisations when he was shot dead three days after the murder of Kinahan gang member David Byrne at the Regency Hotel on February 5th, 2016.
Murphy was married for 26 years and had four children with his wife before the marriage broke down following the Regency attack. He has had a fifth child with another partner since.
His lawyers argued there was no evidence that Murphy foresaw a murder happening on the day of the Regency attack and submitted he was “definitely not at the top end of this”.
