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I've faced down some of Ireland's most dangerous criminals - and some I even liked

Ive been a crime journalist now for more than 26 years and coming face to face with serious gangsters isn't something you can prepare for - you learn on the job

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Michael O'Toole Crime and Defence Editor

05:00, 15 Aug 2026

[Mirror Crime and Defence Editor Michael O'Toole confronts mobster John Gilligan at his home in Spain in 2024.]

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Mirror Crime and Defence Editor Michael O'Toole confronts mobster John Gilligan at his home in Spain in 2024.(Image: Mick O'Neill)

Irelands most dangerous gangster was coming for me. I was doing everything I could not to show any fear to Eamonn 'The Don' Dunne as he angrily confronted me. I was not doing a very good job.

Being abused by criminals is an occupational hazard for any crime reporter normally you simply ignore it. But when the person who is getting stuck into you is the most high profile mobster in the country at the time, you know youre in trouble.

It was early February 2010 and Dunne was up in the Criminal Courts of Justice complex near Dublins Phoenix Park on a minor motoring charge. It was a case that we would normally ignore, but this was different. At the time, Dunne led a vicious drugs gang in Finglas in north Dublin and had already murdered up to 17 people. He was the Gardas number one target and was rarely off the front pages, even though he was never named for legal reasons.

That notoriety made any court appearance involving Dunne of interest to crime reporters, even a speeding case. To my memory, the hearing lasted around a minute before it was adjourned. We all filed out of the court. I found myself walking behind Dunne. He held the door open for me and I thanked him. And then he turned on me.

[Eamonn Dunne]

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Eamonn Dunne

Whats your name? he asked. Mick, I replied, evenly. Michael OToole? From The Star? he asked. Yes, I said, feeling the blood drain from my face. Youre the fella who keeps writing about me, arent you?

No, I lied. No, he insisted. You are. You did this big expos about me last year. You said I was a psychopath.... No, not me, I lied again. No, you did, it was you, he said, his eyes boring right into me. He was right. I had most definitely called him a psychopath. Because he was.

I remember trying not to antagonise him, but also hold my ground. I knew that if I cracked and openly displayed fear to him I was finished.

So I stared at him while he stared at me. The confrontation felt to me that it went on forever, but it was probably just a few seconds. It ended when someone who knew Dunne pulled him away from me. I saw my chance and got out of dodge. I remember actually feeling quite calm as it was happening. I was concentrating too much to worry.

My car was parked in Phoenix Park and it hit me as I walked towards it a few minutes later. To be honest, my knees went as the adrenaline wore off.

[Dunne leaving the Courts in Dublin on March 23, 2010. A month later he was dead.]

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Dunne leaving the Courts in Dublin on March 23, 2010. A month later he was dead.

The following days were a bit of a blur. I had to get security advice. I was told to change my car. I did. I was told to vary my route home.

I did. I was told to keep calm. I didnt. I had a few nervy weeks until the night of April 23, when Dunne was shot dead at 10.04pm as he attended a birthday party in a Dublin pub.

I heard a few minutes later and, with a deadline looming, leapt into action to get the story written. But I must admit a part of me felt relieved that night that I would not have to worry about Eamonn Dunne any more.

Ive been a crime journalist now for more than 26 years and coming face to face with serious gangsters is undoubtedly one of the most challenging aspects of the job.

Its something for which no amount of lectures in journalism college can ever prepare you. You just have to learn on the job. And it can be a hard lesson.

Two weeks and a day before Dunnes murder, I had another unnerving encounter with a killer. On Thursday April 8, 2010, Wayne Dundon stepped gingerly through passport control at Dublin Airport.

He had just flown into Ireland after enjoying a 10-day break in the Mexican resort of Cancun - where he had gone following his release from prison here, after serving a five-and-a-half year sentence for threats to kill. He was the leader of the McCarthy-Dundon gang in Limerick, an outfit at the centre of the feud in the city that saw 20 men killed, most from his side.

[The moment Mirror Man Michael O'Toole, on the left, gets a mouthful from gang boss Wayne Dundon at Dublin Airport in April 2010.]

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The moment Mirror Man Michael O'Toole, on the left, gets a mouthful from gang boss Wayne Dundon at Dublin Airport in April 2010.

He thought he would be able to slip back into Ireland unnoticed - but didn't realise we been tracking him and, with a photographer, I was waiting for the mobster when he passed through customs.

Dundon, then 32, had his antennae working as soon as he walked through the door that leads from the baggage reclaim area to the arrivals hall. He had one foot through the door when he spotted us - at least 40 feet away. He did a seamless pirouette and scurried back inside the baggage area.

But we knew he had to come out again. So we just waited. Around 10 minutes later, he strode confidently out and headed for the terminal exit. We ran ahead of him and ambushed him on the pavement outside.

For a second, he was calmness personified - until I told him who I was. "Michael O'Toole from The Star?" he shouted. "I know you, you c**t."

He then said he knew that I had a brother who was a garda and who served at Garda HQ - neither of which is true. It struck me that it was a clumsy attempt to intimidate me, but it wasn't working.

I kept at him and barraged questions - and to his credit he answered them, although through gritted teeth. Is the Limerick feud over, I asked. "The feud is over a long time ago," he rasped back at me.

We then asked him if the people of Limerick were right to be afraid of him - and he replied: "No. They are to be afraid of you and the s**it that comes out of your mouth.

"I don't want to talk to you - go and talk to somebody else who wants to tell you s**t talk." He was later jailed for life in 2014 for murder and is still locked up today.

'I quite like a lot of them'

It may come as a surprise, but crime reporters do actually talk to criminals. And heres a secret: I quite like a lot of them. Yes, they do bad, sometimes horrible things. Yes, they have access to firearms and would happily use them. But a reporters job is to get information wherever you can and for us crime journalists that means talking to the baddies and the goodies.

There are some criminals I have known for more than 20 years. They have given me information that has always been bang on. And, to be frank, that is more important to me than anything.

For example, at the height of the Kinahan-Hutch feud, the bloody war that cost up to 18 lives and led to a massive Garda crackdown, criminals on both sides talked to the media. They wanted to get their side of the story over, I suppose.

There were occasions when I was given information by a criminal about certain events that were so tight that when I checked I was told only a handful of gardai knew the details.

People would say that the criminals, on both sides, used the media. That is of course true. But I dont think it is a journalists job to censor the information he or she gets. If it is true, just print it.

And it may be unpalatable for some people outside the business, but most crime reporters would admit to actually getting on well with some gangsters. You develop a relationship with them as you do with any source. It can last years, of course you are going to get on with them personally.

And some criminals take a shine to certain reporters. One of them who took such a shine to me was a notorious killer and rapist called Mark 'the Guinea Pig' Desmond.

He really was a dangerous man. He was blamed for six murders, including pals Darren Carey (20) and Patrick Murray (19) whom he shot dead at Dublins Grand Canal around New Years 2000. He was charged with their murders, but the charges were later dropped. He first contacted me from prison while on remand for the murders, and proclaimed his innocence.

[Infamous murderer Mark Desmond, who was in secret contact with Mirror reporter Michael O'Toole before he was himself shot dead in December 2016.]

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Infamous murderer Mark Desmond, who was in secret contact with Mirror reporter Michael O'Toole before he was himself shot dead in December 2016.(Image: MAXPIX)

He then started contacting me again around 2010, after members of the Dublin Real IRA began murdering other gangsters in an extortion racket. He claimed to be behind a group of gangsters called the Criminal Action Force who were fighting back against the RIRA. He tried to stay anonymous when he contacted me, but it soon became clear to me who he was.

The group called me to an urgent meeting one Sunday winter evening and in my haste to get the story made me make the biggest mistake of my career. They asked to meet me in Merrion Square Park. It was closed and I had to climb over the railings to get in. It was dark when two men in balaclavas suddenly appeared in front of me.

They made me turn around and stand with my back to them in an isolated and hidden part of the park. I did as I was told and cursed my stupidity. In the rush to get the story, I had conducted no risk assessment and no security review. Nor had I told anyone where I was going.

I was at the mercy of a serial killer and a man who repeatedly raped other young men and boys. My heart was in my mouth, but I escaped unscathed. Desmond is probably one of the masked men in these photos CAF sent me. But well never know for sure as he never confirmed that to me and he was shot dead in December 2016.

[Members of Mark Desmond's Criminal Action Force in a propaganda photo he sent to Mirror reporter Michael O'Toole.]

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Members of Mark Desmond's Criminal Action Force in a propaganda photo he sent to Mirror reporter Michael O'Toole.

Before his death, he used to regularly ring me and rant for a good 30 minutes. The calls went on so long I would pretend someone else was calling me to get rid of him.

And sometimes, a journalist gets on with a gangster despite not wanting to. The man gardai believe shot dead crime reporter Veronica Guerin in Dublin in June 1996 for John Gilligans gang was a criminal called Patrick Dutchy Holland. He was never charged, but was named in the Special Criminal Court by a detective as the person she believed pulled the trigger.

I interviewed him in, of all places, Rome in mid 2006 after he was released from prison in Ireland where he served a 12 year sentence for being part of Gilligans drugs gang.

I asked him all the hard questions and he answered them, but I knew he was lying when he denied Ms Guerins murder. We chatted for an around an hour and, loathe as I am to admit it, I got on with him. I didnt want to, but I did.

I next saw him in December of that year, this time in Dublin. I was covering the funeral of gangland killer Marlo Hyland - himself murdered by Eamonn Dunne - and I popped into a caf beforehand for a coffee.

Holland was sitting there with some pals. He saw me and hailed me and was perfectly fine. Quite friendly and civil, to be honest. He died in June 2009.

While Dutchy was fine to me, his boss certainly was not. John Gilligan is by a mile the criminal who has unnerved me the most on the occasions that I have confronted him.

I did that in Spain in 2021 and then again in 2024, He was living in Torrevieja near Alicante and photographer Mick ONeill went to confront him in 2021, the 25th anniversary of the murder of Ms Guerin.

[Mick O'Neill's photo of gangster John Gilligan being confronted by Mirror Crime and Defence Editor Michael O'Toole in Spain last year.]

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Mick O'Neill's photo of gangster John Gilligan being confronted by Mirror Crime and Defence Editor Michael O'Toole in Spain last year.

We approached him again in 2024 when we heard he was seriously ill. He blanked us on both occasions but Ill be honest, heworriedme.

I knew all too well about his propensity for violence - such as brutally assaulting Ms Guerin before the murder and the threat to kidnap and rape her young son.

When I confronted him, I could feel the violence about him, like an obscene aura. It was there, simmering, ready to explode at any second. I was glad to get away from him, to be honest.

He is by far the most dangerous and menacing criminal I have ever encountered. I hope I never meet him again. But I'll still keep confronting criminals. And maybe even getting on with some of them.

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[Michael O'Toole]

Michael O'Toole

Michael O'Toole is Crime and Defence Editor for both the Irish Mirror and Irish Daily Star. He has more than 30 years' experience at the coalface of Irish crime journalism. He brings expert insight into all aspects of modern crime, from international gang bosses and terrorism to street criminals and the scourge of domestic violence. Michael also covers military matters and has travelled to Lebanon, Syria, Chad, Liberia and the Arctic Circle with the Irish Defence Forces. Michael has also written several non fiction and fiction crime books, including the critically acclaimed Black Light novel. Michael also co-edits our Crime Ireland newsletter.

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