A MAN murdered in a busy pub on Saturday evening tried to escape, but was held down by his attackers and shot in the head.
Paul Martin (39) from Kippure Park, Finglas, Dublin, was shot in the Jolly Toper Pub on Church Street, Finglas, just before 7pm. Another man was injured in the shooting. Martin's was the twelfth gun murder of the year.
Two masked men armed with handguns entered the upstairs of the pub just outside Finglas village and singled out their victims. Martin tried to flee, but his attackers went after him and pinned him down in the pub, discharging shots into his head and upper body.
He was taken by ambulance to the Mater hospital where he was pronounced dead a short time later. The injured man was recovering at the hospital last night.
Gardaí sealed off the murder scene, which underwent examination by the Garda Technical Bureau yesterday. The murder was witnessed by many other customers in the upstairs of the pub, where a gathering was taking place following a funeral earlier on Saturday.
After the killing, the gunmen ran to a dark-coloured car parked outside the pub. They were last seen speeding towards nearby Finglas Road.
Gardaí are keeping an open mind on the motive for the murder. However, the dead man is known to have clashed recently with criminals from Finglas and knew his life was under threat.
One line of inquiry is that Martin was murdered in a row over the proceeds of an armed robbery. Gardaí believe the killing was well-planned and that those behind it had accurate information on their target's whereabouts and probably had him under surveillance.
Supt John Hartnett appealed for anyone who may have seen the gunmen or the getaway car to contact the Garda. He said both gunmen wore dark clothing. Both men were described as being of slim build. One of the men was just over 6ft tall while the other was just under 6ft.
Martin was a drug dealer and an armed robber. He was an associate of gang leader Martin "Marlo" Hyland (39), who was shot dead at a house in Scribblestown Park, Finglas, in December, 2006.
In October 1986, then aged 17, Martin was driving a stolen car when it crashed into a bus on the North Circular Road in Dublin. Three of his teenage friends sitting in the rear seat were killed. Martin was sentenced in 1987 to three years for dangerous driving causing death.
He was one of a large number of people questioned about the murder of Finglas man John Dillon in January 1999. The 53-year-old taxi driver was shot dead at his home in Glenties Park by criminals who believed he had supplied information to the Garda about them.
Martin was part of a gang that included his brother John and which robbed £132,000 in cash from the Bank of Ireland in Ardee, Co Louth, on November 17th, 1997.
Paul Martin was sentenced to a six-year sentence after pleading guilty to handling the stolen money. A gun was used to threaten staff during the raid.
The money was left in a laneway just outside Ardee.
When Martin and his brother John went back to collect it the next day, they were arrested. After his arrest, Paul Martin smeared himself with excrement in a bid to frustrate witnesses identifying him in a Garda line-up.
He is believed to have driven the getaway car during a 1992 post office robbery at Ross Cross, Dunshaughlin, Co Meath, in which one of his associates, Robert McGrath (26) of Finglas Place, was shot dead after he pointed a sawn-off shotgun at gardaí.
Martin fled to the UK after the robbery and escaped prosecution.
In 1991, he helped one of his brothers, David Martin, to escape while serving a seven-year prison sentence.
He and other men approached prison officers in the Mater hospital, where they were escorting David Martin for an X-ray. The officers were told they would be "blown away" if they did not unlock David Martin from handcuffs. He escaped, but was later re-arrested.
