“Christopher Kinahan is probably the most successful and entrepreneurial criminal that Ireland has ever produced.” Say hello on Facebook, Instagram and TikTok. Sign up for our occasional newsletter, The Accomplice. Follow the show and review us on Apple Podcasts. Sign up for Criminal Plus to get behind-the-scenes bonus episodes of Criminal, ad-free listening of all of our shows, special merch deals, and more. We also make This is Love and Phoebe Reads a Mystery. Artwork by Julienne Alexander. Check out our online shop. Episode transcripts are posted on our website. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices
Chapter 1: Who is Christopher Kinahan and why is he significant?
Christopher Kinahan is probably the most successful and entrepreneurial criminal that Ireland has ever produced. He is currently a billionaire. He controls much of the cocaine trade in Europe. It could be argued that he is one of the most prolific criminals that Europe has ever produced.
John Mooney is an investigative journalist with the Sunday Times in Dublin. He reports on organized crime.
Chapter 2: How did Christopher Kinahan build his criminal empire?
In the 1980s, Ireland witnessed the arrival of drugs, and that came in the form of heroin, which caused havoc to inner-city communities. Kennehan was someone who was involved in this business, but wasn't at the pinnacle or the apex of it. At the time, he was employed as a taxi driver, but he appeared to be wholesaling heroin. He wasn't a street dealer.
He was supplying drugs to people who did operate at street level.
But over the years, Christopher Kinahan began to build a large criminal organization called the Kinahan Cartel.
Not a lot of people would have known his name unlike other serious criminals from that time who had reputations that preceded them and often featured in newspapers and in the tabloids and in, you know, local folklore in certain parts of the city. They liked the notoriety of being photographed and filmed and and having their names and reputations covered in the tabloid press in particular.
But Kinahan was very different. He kind of kept himself to himself. He shunned publicity. No one really knew a lot about him.
Christopher Kinahan has been described as photo-weary. There aren't many photos of him online or in newspapers.
When I've spoken to people who met him at that time, the one thing that always struck them about this guy was he seemed very together, very well-spoken man, well-educated and could pass himself off as a businessman or someone maybe who, you know, if he had pursued a different type of career, could have got involved in stockbroking or banking or something like that.
So he was a mystery in many ways.
The Kinahan cartel is reportedly led today by Christopher Kinahan, who's now in his 60s, and his sons, Daniel and Christopher Jr., both in their 40s. John Mooney has been investigating Christopher Kinahan and his sons for a long time.
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Chapter 3: What role do Christopher Kinahan's sons play in his operations?
Although I would stay here again for tourist break, as I believe it offers good facilities for a reasonable price. The reviews are from all over the world. Zimbabwe, South Africa, Turkey, Hong Kong, Belgium.
These turned out to be quite instrumental and important in terms of mapping out where he was travelling, but also on occasion, people that he was engaging with. So, for example, he would maybe book himself into a hotel. And we were able to identify other people that were in that vicinity at similar times and identify these people as being associates of Kinahan's.
And indeed, I think we identified a number of parties that are involved in his financial activities that I'm pretty sure the security services still don't know about.
Investigative journalists have reported that Christopher Kinahan has tried to set up a new base in Zimbabwe, near known drug trafficking routes, and tried to purchase a fleet of military aircraft. Journalists have also reported that the cartel tried to buy gold in Zimbabwe to move it through South Africa to Dubai as a way of laundering money.
Kinahan's Google reviews confirmed that he'd spent a lot of time in those two countries. He reviewed an airport cafe in Johannesburg. We witnessed a stunning sunset as we shared drinks and discussed some business. The food was good. The company equally as good. But the only slight drawback was that the service was not quite equal to the cuisine.
In one restaurant review, Christopher Kinahan complained about a waitress who kept calling him boss. We asked John Mooney to read the review.
I did explain that I did not like to be called boss and please could you call me Chris, Mr. Vincent or Sir. The waitress tittered. I thought nothing more of it until we were paying my bill. My friend was kind enough to pay the bill and were about to leave when the same waitress made a point of saying, thanks boss.
Were you surprised when you read the reviews?
I was and I wasn't. I was a little bit taken aback that someone who was the subject of an international manhunt would carry a phone to begin with, because I thought he wouldn't carry a phone in case it could be used to track his movements. I was completely astonished that they would be taking images on that phone and uploading them onto Google. for anyone to see.
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Chapter 4: How did the Kinahan-Hutch feud escalate?
I'd also like to know if there are areas of this that have been misinterpreted, that maybe there were other dynamics going on within the family, within the organisation. But he's the only person that can really tell that story. And so far, he's chosen to remain silent on that.
But I have to say, I do think there will come a day where he'll send for someone like me or it could be someone else to certainly put on record what happened and his story. And I'd really love to hear that.
Well, if you're out there listening, get in touch with John. He's ready.
I won't hold my breath.
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2024 is almost in the books. Complete. Happy New Year. Happy New Year, Lauren. I always think about... how odd it is like that we've actually had 24 years since 2000 do you think about that you're thinking about y2k yeah 2025 that sounds wild to me where were you on new year's eve in 1999 oh i was i have a very good place that i was i was in the middle of lake superior uh on an ice road
that ran from Bayfield, Wisconsin to Madeline Island. It's a miles-long road across Lake Superior, way, way up in northern Wisconsin. It was about negative 12. And I had walked out on the ice road all by myself. In the middle, the most wonderful thing about this ice road is they would line it with old Christmas trees to kind of show you the path. And
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