by John Mooney
Mary Queen of Angels gave Gilligan confidence. It was a place where he could develop as a child, while at home he was given jobs and subjected to violence. In school he could do as the other children did, play marbles in the spring, relivio in the summer and conkers in the autumn when the chestnuts would fall. Friends of his from that time say he excelled at spinning tops, a game where the children pitched coins at a wall and whosever landed the closest got the money. Gilligan’s interest in gambling commenced early on in his life.
The young Gilligans went without comics and luxury items like toys because of their father’s fondness for alcohol; all they could do was dream about action men and toy soldiers while music was something they occasionally heard on the radio. Television was a novelty sometimes seen in the homes of privileged neighbours.
By the time Gilligan was 12 years old his father had become a burglar who was well known to members of An Garda Síochána; but it was in the north inner city that Johnno was most notorious. There he recruited youngsters slightly older than his own children to steal from local shops.
‘Old Johnno had this knack of hitting his backside off the door to break the lock,’ remembered Maurice Ward, one youth from his gang. ‘He was such a small man that we used to wonder how he did it. He would rob anything, sweets, money, anything. A big thing with him was Gillette razor blades. He would sell them around the docks.’
In life, Johnno’s brothers had fared much better than he had. His brother Thomas had joined the British Army, while Frank had become an important figure in the Seaman’s Union of Ireland, a position he used to secure Johnno menial work on the Britain & Irish Line. Sarah Gilligan did not want her sons turning out like their father, so when John Gilligan left Mary Queen of Angels without any qualifications at 14 years of age, she sent him to Uncle Frank who got him a job with the B&I Line.
Frank was fond of his nephew and started him off working as a cabin boy in the hope that he would join the merchant navy and get a decent career. For a time, he worked on the ferries that crossed between Holyhead and Liverpool; he is remembered as being a ‘good little worker who gave no cheek’.
Gilligan kept in touch with the staff of Mary Queen of Angels and often returned to the school to look for advice and to say hello. For this, he is still remembered.
A year after he left school, John Gilligan had his first brush with the law. He was not yet 15 when he appeared in Rathfarnham District Court on 3 March 1967 charged with larceny. He was given probation and warned not to get into trouble again by the judge.
But Gilligan was destined for a life of crime. He also lived in the shadow of his father’s reputation; nothing seemed to work for him. No matter how hard he tried, he could not shake off his father’s reputation for being a drunkard, although he himself rarely consumed alcohol. He spent the next few years at sea moving between various jobs on ferries and merchant ships that travelled between Ireland and England.
He later joined the merchant navy and travelled the world, making 36 trips to far-flung destinations. He worked on the now-defunct Canadian Pacific line that travelled between Montreal and Liverpool. His seaman’s record book, numbered E10214, describes his conduct as ‘very good’. He was formally discharged as a seaman on 31 July 1980.
Like most of the youngsters he grew up with, Gilligan never moved out of home and left his possessions at Lough Conn Road. When on shore leave, he would return to Ballyfermot to visit his family and meet with friends and talk at length about rock ‘n’ roll, his travels at sea and, of course, girls, one of whom he was developing a keen interest in.
Matilda Geraldine Dunne was the ‘besotted girl next door’ who developed a crush on John Gilligan when she was just 14 years of age. She remembered: ‘I think I was skipping or playing with my friends and I saw him. I thought he was great—just gorgeous—and fell for him. He was just a happy-go-lucky sort of fella. He was a nice fella and that’s why I liked him.’
What she saw in him, no one knows. Gilligan was certainly more mature than his admirer. The two also came from diametrically opposed backgrounds. Her parents were a respectable family who lived on Kylemore Drive; her father Martin and mother Martha, née Lynch, were highly regarded by their peers and neighbours. Geraldine’s father worked as a boilerman for CIÉ. It is said that she was the black sheep of his brood, leaving school at 12 to work as a trainee dressmaker in a shop called Abbot’s Belts, Buckles and Buttons.
The Gilligans were an altogether different family. But love works in strange ways and work it did. Gilligan took more than a passing interest in the girl. The two started courting. The only thing that prevented them from getting married was Geraldine’s young age.
As time passed, the relationship became more serious. She eventually started working as a chef on the ferries, accompanying Gilligan on voyages. Her father was powerless to intervene, although he had serious doubts about his future son-in-law’s suitability. If he said no to the romance, the girl would have taken flight, and he feared she would not return.
Her parents pressed the young couple to get married in the Catholic Church. Two days before John Gilligan’s 22nd birthday, on 27 March 1974, Father John Wall married them in Ballyfermot Church. Six months later, on 11 September, Geraldine gave birth to a daughter, Tracy. The couple also produced a son, born on 13 September 1975. It was Geraldine who decided against calling Darren after his father on the advice of Uncle Frank.
‘Frank told me not to call him John because he would have felt he had to live up to his father. I think there were four generations of John Gilligans, and Frank said it was time to break the chain. All the Johns had ended up as criminals. That’s why Darren wasn’t called John after his dad,’ she once recounted.
The young bride’s in-laws liked her. They saw her as a stabilising influence on Gilligan, who was fast developing a deep interest in crime and robbery. The newly weds couldn’t afford their own home and so they moved into the already-overcrowded 5 Lough Conn Road with Sarah Gilligan and her growing brood. Their presence added to the sheer turmoil of the house. They wanted privacy but couldn’t get it in a house filled to capacity with people. Geraldine pushed her husband to get a house or flat; anything away from the sprawling housing estates of Ballyfermot.
Eventually Gilligan found a flat on Charleville Avenue in Dublin’s North Strand. It was small and cluttered but at least the newlyweds had privacy and could come and go as they pleased. The couple lived between houses until 1977, when they moved into a council house at 13 Corduff Avenue in Blanchardstown in west Dublin.
But John Gilligan followed the life path already determined for him by circumstances. He stopped working on the ferry line and turned to crime like his father before him. Gilligan, though, changed his world to accomplish what his father could only dream of—the notoriety of being a multimillionaire gangster and the most dangerous man in the underworld.
Chapter 3
The Wild West
‘Those were the best days of my life.’
John Gilligan
From 1896 to 1901, Robert Leroy Parker and his sidekick Harry Longbaugh, forever known as Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid, roamed the desolate plains of Wyoming, Utah and Colorado with a gang of ten or so misfits, robbing whenever the opportunity arose. They were collectively known as the Hole-in-the-Wall Gang and, under the tutelage of Parker, pioneered the art of robbing banks, mail vans and stagecoaches, using means other than armed confrontation. Instead, the outlaws would blast their way into bank vaults using dynamite stolen from the Union Pacific Railroad and help themselves to whatever they could get away with. Almost a century later, history repeated itself when a similar bunch of misfits came together in Dublin.
They too called themselves the Hole-in-the-Wall Gang. Only this time, they roamed the industrial estates of west Dublin in stolen vans and trucks, breaking into warehouses, hijacking mail vans and freight containers laden
with goods destined for supermarket shelves. They too entered premises by making a hole in a wall, only their technique involved brute force: smashing down bricks and mortar with sledgehammers. These men also looked up to a leader—a devious and cunning young man who was meticulous in his approach to crime. Like all gangster figures, he was given his own nickname by the press—they called him Warehouse John. The police called him John Gilligan.
When his seafaring career ended, Gilligan chose to become a criminal. ‘If you want to get rich, why work when you can rob? Why get up at eight in the morning when you can go out at eight at night and get anything you like?’ were words he repeated to friends. This became his philosophy. From 1980 to 1990, Gilligan’s Hole-in-the-Wall Gang wreaked havoc, plundering the industrial estates lying scattered off the motorways that take travellers from Dublin to the cities of Cork and Limerick. They would steal anything they could lay their hands on: trucks, cars, refrigerators, animal-health products, computer games, vacuum cleaners, sweets, chocolates, power tools—anything that could be sold. Gilligan orchestrated hundreds of robberies that netted him hundreds of thousands of pounds, most of which he squandered gambling. He knew every square foot of his stomping ground: every road; every warehouse; every fire escape; every side entrance; every waste ground; and so he knew where to strike, when to strike and how to escape.
‘They were the good old days,’ he once remarked. ‘I used to tell people that I lived in the “hereafter land” because when I arrived in the industrial estates I would say, “This is what I’m here after” and the Garda Síochána would say, “We’re here after Gilligan.” They were great days. There was loads of times when we’d get chased, sometimes we’d get something, other times we’d get nothing. I got a great buzz in those days. Nine times out of ten the owners wouldn’t have known we’d been in. In some cases, the owners were happy because they got insurance on devalued goods. I wasn’t into bank robberies because that involved firearms and I could get shot. When we’d go down for a stretch we’d write to the other lads, messing, pretending to sell the rights to steal from other industrial estates. It was great fun because we knew the prison officials saw the letters. We were like the Mafia.’[1]
Although his flat Dublin accent and shabby dress code bore no similarity to the suave gangsters of the Cosa Nostra he watched in films, his criminal operation was just as sophisticated. The truth was that in the space of a few years, by the time he was 30 years old, Gilligan had become a major figure in organised crime. By day he would act out the part of the family man, the hard-working loyal husband and father. This persona lived in Corduff and travelled into Dublin city centre where he ran a second-hand car salesroom. Here, he sold second-hand Ford Capris and other cheap models to anyone unfortunate enough to venture on to his forecourt. Unfortunate because if the car broke down, Gilligan simply wouldn’t entertain them.
It was at night that the true criminal in Gilligan came to life. Whilst the city slept, he would emerge with his band of thieves and set about plundering warehouses. Accompanied by one or two of his lieutenants, he would drive south across the city to his turf, the Robinhood or Cookstown industrial estates. Like a cat burglar, he would reconnoitre his surroundings, looking for ways to break and enter; he would search for an entrance in the perimeter fencing and for ways to bypass security systems. ‘We would sit there all night, waiting for the security guard to arrive, time how long it took the guard to check the locks, what doors he checked, how thorough his checks were and see which way he approached,’ remembered Maurice Ward, who went on to join the gang.[2]
Gilligan would then scout around looking for rubbish. ‘Get me some pallets, we need to light a bit of a fire,’ he would say. He would build a bonfire against the side of the warehouse and set it alight before retreating back into the undergrowth.
The raiders would return the next night. ‘Right, lads, we know what we’re here to do. Everyone into position.’
They would act with military-like co-ordination. Two men would run towards the industrial estate entrance, walkie-talkies at the ready should a passing garda patrol stumble upon the heist. With professional skill, another two men would approach the warehouse and skirt around the wall until they found the section scorched by the fire Gilligan had set ablaze the previous night.
‘Come on lads, faster, faster,’ he would shout.
With resolute body co-ordination, they would attack the wall with sledgehammers. The heat from the fire would have dried out the mortar and the brickwork, so it would just crumble away, leaving a gaping hole for the thieves to enter.
Thump . . . thump . . . thump . . .
‘We’re through, boss.’
Gilligan would inspect the demolition work. ‘Well, what are you waiting for?’
Security systems in those days were humble devices designed to act as deterrents. Alarms were mostly battery operated, so Gilligan would simply knock them off the walls and take out the batteries. Once the ‘security system’ was disabled, he would set about the warehouse, stocktaking, compiling a mental inventory of the goods on offer. Once this was done, he would order one of the gang to prepare the trucks. Walkie-talkie in hand, he would give the sign, and they would arrive within minutes, entering the warehouse via the goods entrance.
‘Remember, lads, what’s my favourite saying?’
‘Why leave anything, boss?’
‘Get to work,’ he would shout.
Entire warehouses and factories would be cleared. Nothing of any value was left. ‘We would spend hours just loading up our own trucks and making sure we left no fingerprints or evidence. He would take everything, paint brushes, boxes of nails—he even robbed the spare tyres off lorries and the tools. If it was worth anything, he would take it. I never saw anyone like him. Ropes, hammers, nails, car batteries—everything would be taken,’ recalled Ward.
The Hole in the Wall’s stomping ground lay between the industrial expanses that surround Tallaght, Clondalkin and Ballyfermot. Businesses located in the Robinhood and Cookstown industrial estates were particularly affected because of Gilligan’s familiarity with the area. He believed that even if the gardaí caught him robbing a factory here, he could escape.
At that time, the Garda Síochána concentrated all its efforts and resources on combating the Provisional IRA and the other paramilitary organisations. Organised crime was considered something ephemeral in Garda headquarters; men like Gilligan didn’t rate in the general scheme of things. The Government and the Department of Justice were categorically told there was no organised crime problem in Ireland. This belief filtered into all sections of Irish society and was quoted verbatim by the media at large, with the exception of some individual journalists. There were, of course, some gardaí who could see what was happening. Gilligan’s small stature, devil-may-care attitude and churlishness towards authority didn’t fool them. They were watching a petty thief turn into a master criminal before their eyes. There was no stopping his gang.
Gilligan expanded his operation to rural areas. By 1985 he felt confident using weapons and extreme violence. Warehouse robberies were no longer his speciality—he targeted mail vans and payroll deliveries. Violence was something the Hole-in-the-Wall Gang had no problem dispensing.
The Garda found it was near to impossible to combat his criminal operation. Gilligan had so much regard for gardaí and the lengths to which they would go to charge him with a serious offence that he never took the same route twice, discussed crime over the phone or left any piece of evidence that could link him to a crime. He made all the arrangements for the gang so that no one could betray him. If he had to meet someone, he went to them. Under no circumstances did they arrive at his front door. He never held any stolen property at his home in Corduff, and so the Garda knew there was no point in raiding it.
His extensive connections in the business world were more than willing to allow him to store stolen goods in their warehouses
. And because he sold his loot at knockdown prices to ‘reputable businessmen’, he slept assured that his products were laundered into the system fast, making it almost impossible to trace them.
Even when the Garda did manage to catch him red-handed, he always seemed to find a loophole to beat a charge, as happened in the Nilfisk case.
There wasn’t a star in the sky when Niall McClory closed the door behind him and locked up his premises. Grey clouds, the type that seem to float in suspended animation over Dublin’s skyline, blotted out the moonlight. Cookstown Industrial Estate was lifeless; the familiar sounds of forklifts and delivery trucks, which normally deafened those working there, were absent. It was 2 January 1986. The managers and factory workers were still on holiday, recuperating from the Christmas and New Year celebrations. It was McClory’s first day back at Nilfisk. He had to return early to take delivery of 850 new vacuum cleaners that had arrived from Germany. What better way to start off the year than with a new delivery, he thought to himself as he walked to his car parked outside the warehouse. He had just got in when he saw a masked man approach wielding a baton.
‘Get out of the car,’ yelled his assailant.
More men suddenly appeared. ‘Open the door. Open the door.’
McClory was overcome by fear. His assailants had come from nowhere; he had no way of escaping in any case, so he opened the door.
‘Get down on the floor. If you don’t co-operate we’ll shoot you. Do you understand?’
He could not see a weapon, but fearing they had a gun and would shoot him dead, he obeyed the command. One of the gang handcuffed his hands behind his back and the factory’s security man was forced to lie in a similar position. They were made to look down. The next few hours seemed never-ending and the atmosphere was tense as the two hostages wondered if they would be freed. Wearing a balaclava, Gilligan stood with a two-way radio clenched in one hand, shouting instructions to the others. ‘Send in the truck.’
