A man close to some members of the Hutch family has died after being shot in Dublin’s north inner city on Tuesday night.
He had been warned by the Garda his life was at risk due to the Kinahan-Hutch feud.
However, the victim had also clashed with criminals from Ballymun. Those men had also threatened his life because they believed he played a role in a serious attack on one of their associates in Dublin three years ago.
Tuesday night’s shooting appears to be linked to the Ballymun-based dispute rather than the Kinahan-Hutch feud. However, sources stressed the investigation into the latest attack was still in the early stages.
The shooting occurred at about 9.45pm at James Larkin House on the North Strand in Dublin 1.
The victim, who is in his 20s, was shot in the abdomen. The emergency services were called and the injured man was rushed by ambulance to the Mater Hospital for emergency treatment. However he was later pronounced dead.
The scene has been sealed off and gardaí in Store Street Garda station have begun an investigation and have appealed for witnesses ton contact them.
The shooting comes 10 days after Derek Coakley Hutch (27) was shot dead outside Cloverhill Prison, west Dublin - the latest victim of the Kinahan-Hutch feud - and the night before his funeral.
And last Friday a convicted armed robber from north inner city Dublin was wounded in a shooting outside a boxing tournament at the national stadium, South Circular Road.
The man wounded last Friday was at one time closely associated with criminals from both the Kinahan and Hutch sides of the feud, though is closer to the Hutch faction.
However, gardaí now believe the attack on him outside the National Stadium was linked to the feud in Ballymun, rather than the Kinahan-Hutch feud.
And Garda sources said the man shot on Tuesday night, like Friday’s victim, was also at risk from both the Kinahan gang and from criminals in Ballymun.
Ballymun link
While the investigation into this latest shooting has only just begun, detectives believe it is more likely linked to the feud involving the criminals in Ballymun.
As part of that feud two people were killed in a gun attack in Ballymun last summer and two others were wounded but survived.
Mother-of-six Antoinette Corbally (48), and Clinton Shannon, a 30-year-old Dubliner, were killed in the attack last August.
They were shot dead outside the Corbally family Ballymun home in an attack intended for Ms Corbally’s brother Derek “Bottler” Devoy (38). He escaped uninjured.
The victim of Tuesday night’s shooting is regarded as a dangerous criminal involved on the Hutch side of the worsening feud, which has cost 14 lives to date.
In recent years while on remand in a Dublin prison he appeared before the courts and asked the judge to sentence him because he would be moved out of the remand wing into another area of the prison system.
He said he feared for his safety in the section of the jail where he was being kept at the time.
The dead man is from the area where he was shot and was on bail relating to several, mostly minor, offences.
He is the father of at least one child.
Shock
The shooting happened a short walk from where the body of Derek Coakley-Hutch was being waked by his family ahead of his funeral on Wednesday.
Locals at the scene on Tuesday night expressed shock at the latest shooting in the north inner city. One man said “the world’s gone mad. The night before the funeral”, and shook his head.
Gardaí are appealing for witnesses to contact them at Store Street Garda station on 01 666 800.
