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Corkman facing 12 years in Philippines jail says drugs were planted on him in airport

Éanna Ó Cochláin and his family say they have received no support from Irish authorities.

A CORKMAN WHO is stranded in the Philippines is waiting for a knock on the door to bring him to jail for a crime he says he is innocent of.

Éanna Ó Cochláin was sentenced to 12 years in prison for smuggling 0.38 grams of cannabis through Laoag International Airport in July 2013.

The 56-year-old was searched by authorities three times when passing through the Philippines with his wife Jho, after settling the estate of her father who had recently passed away.

During the third search, two dry sticks of cannabis were found in his pocket in a box of Marlboros.

The psychiatric nurse, who lived in London with his wife and daughter, denies any knowledge of the drugs and says they were planted on him.

download Patrick Coughlan Patrick Coughlan

Three years ago the court case took place and he was sentenced to 12 years. He served a week in prison before appealing the case.

Éanna is now currently waiting to be arrested after losing his second appeal of the sentence.

Private investigator Eamonn Gavin is representing Ó Cochláin, he told TheJournal.ie that the Philippines has a known problem of “tanim bala”, a term used to describe when bullets or drugs are planting on unsuspecting travelers.

This practice is currently under attack by the new President of the Philippines, President Rodrigo Duterte, who is pursuing a massive crackdown on drugs and drug pushers – even ordering the killings of people on the streets.

He recently stated that he’d be ”happy to slaughter” millions of drug addicts, comparing his country’s drug war to the Holocaust.

Discussing what this could mean for Ó Cochláin, Gavin said, ”I don’t think he’s nervous that anything will happen him.

You can be ultra careful but still find a bullet in your luggage, or as Éanna found, in his pocket.

‘Irish politicians are not interested’

Gavin criticised Irish politicians saying they have not taken any interest in the case, “our Irish politicians are not interested”.

To be fairly brutal, nobody has given a damn. He (Éanna) cannot see why the Irish government won’t try and help.

Ó Cochláin’s wife Jho told George Hook on Newstalk:

In June last year I met Noirin O’Sullivan. They said they will do all they can to support and help us but nothing has happened so far.

TheJournal.ie contacted the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade about the case. It said it is “aware of the case and providing consular assistance” but did not have details about what action was being taken.

However, Gavin added that Éanna is starting to get support from elsewhere:

Very experienced investigators in the US have taken up his case because they feel an injustice is being done.

“Since his latest appeal was turned down in August – his only option now is to go to the Supreme Court, which he is prepared to do.”

Éanna has lost his mother and a brother and sister in the last three years while he has been held in the Philippines and was not able to get back to Ireland to attend their funerals.

Gavin also added that Ó Cochláin has an excellent CV as a psychiatric nurse and has worked for the royal family in Saudi Arabia and has even lectured against drugs.

An online petition that was set up has over 10,500 signatures.

Read: Setback for Cork family trying to free brother from 12-year sentence in the Philippines>

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39 Comments
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    Mute Shane Corry
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    Apr 10th 2019, 12:32 PM

    Sounds like a complete non-story. So some employee of a contractor made a mistake, it was quickly resolved within an hour and they are getting compensation?

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    Mute happinessnow
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    Apr 10th 2019, 12:52 PM

    @Sean Murphy: Is that true? Actually I don’t even know why I ask you that, Lawless Ireland, build more prison spaces ASAP.

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    Mute Candace
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    Apr 10th 2019, 12:57 PM

    @Sean Murphy:

    What part of the country?

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    Mute Sean Murphy
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    Apr 10th 2019, 12:59 PM
    76
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    Mute Ted Murray
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    Apr 10th 2019, 1:05 PM

    @Sean Murphy: __ He should have one last taxi ride, to Dublin Airport.

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    Mute Sean Murphy
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    Apr 10th 2019, 1:06 PM

    @Candace: Dublin, of course! Our most ‘diverse’ city so therefore our ‘strongest’, or so the leftists say!

    58
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    Mute Dave O'Keeffe
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    Apr 10th 2019, 1:14 PM

    @Sean Murphy: that’s shocking. Our Judiciary is truly fu(ked.

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    Mute gerard carey
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    Apr 10th 2019, 1:17 PM

    @Sean Murphy: You won’t hear about that on the journal. Independent.ie covered it. It’s like a bad April fools joke.

    64
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    Mute Shane Corry
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    Apr 10th 2019, 1:24 PM

    @Sean Murphy: Wow that judgement is horrendous though I can’t say it isn’t typical of the Irish judicial system – the only country that allows those with 100s of previous convictions to repeately get away with crimes with no punishment.

    He has two teenage daughters too according to that article while the women he assaulted were in their teens or early 20s! Should have had his taxi license revoked & imprisoned for at least 6 months.

    62
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    Mute Dermot Foley
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    Apr 10th 2019, 2:30 PM

    @Sean Murphy: what exactly is your point. Whataboutery of the highest order. Was it just to mention the fact he’s from Pakistan?

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    Mute Has-an
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    Apr 10th 2019, 2:30 PM

    @Sean Murphy: there is a big problem in Irish law Enforce.
    How he could let get out of it and permit to continue driving taxi?

    23
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    Mute Sean Murphy
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    Apr 10th 2019, 4:48 PM

    @Dermot Foley: Well my point was obvious to anyone with a room temperature IQ. Someone being mildly inconvenienced at an airport is much less newsworthy than a foreign taxi driver sexually assaulting Irish women and being allowed to continue drive taxis as long as the women sit in the back seat. They have since deleted my comment and finally reported on it.

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    Mute Dave O'Keeffe
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    Apr 10th 2019, 5:36 PM

    @Sean Murphy: question, wasn’t one of the women German? And also what the hell does it matter where the women are from?

    11
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    Mute Mark Plunkett
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    Apr 10th 2019, 8:50 PM

    @Sean Murphy: just read that story what a joke,just make sure the girls sit in the back of the cab when you go out hunting again for the 4th time,some joke of a country we have become??

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    Mute Rei
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    Apr 10th 2019, 10:32 PM

    @Sean Murphy: what does it matter where he’s from? It doesnt.
    It’s just an excuse for xenophobia. Plenty of Irish lads just as despicable.

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    Mute Eoin O'C
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    Apr 10th 2019, 12:55 PM

    “If you love me, make some noise”

    Jesus, that’s some ego he’s got. Nothing like a bit of twitter-fuelled self-entitlement to get your way

    247
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    Mute Jindrich Marz
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    Apr 10th 2019, 3:18 PM

    @Eoin O’C: Not to get his way but to get the legal way.

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    Mute Conor Kennelly
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    Apr 10th 2019, 3:36 PM

    @Eoin O’C: what’s your issue, he was only asking for what he was perfectly entitled to, the freedom to travel to this country for which he had the correct travel documents.

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    Mute Rei
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    Apr 10th 2019, 10:34 PM

    @Eoin O’C: I don’t see the problem. Companies react when they’re blasted on social media. Smart move really.

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    Mute Coco86
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    Apr 10th 2019, 12:30 PM

    Human error…… Happens to us all

    114
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    Mute Coco86
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    Apr 10th 2019, 12:31 PM

    @Coco86: Plus Ryanair have resolved the situation. The only outrage here is the lengths people have to go through for decent customer service from Ryanair!

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    Mute Shane Corry
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    Apr 10th 2019, 12:34 PM

    @Coco86: He posted it on Twitter, they replied in less than an hour, before the tweet had gotten popular and managed to resolve it while he kept tweeting swear words at them repeatedly https://twitter.com/iyad_elbaghdadi/status/1115906034814599168. I don’t get the issue here.

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    Mute Neil Ryan
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    Apr 10th 2019, 12:38 PM

    @Shane Corry: He lost any sympathy as soon as he resorted to using foul language.

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    Mute Coco86
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    Apr 10th 2019, 12:43 PM

    @Shane Corry: Fair enough, hadn’t seen tweets from him to Ryanair

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    Mute Dave O'Keeffe
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    Apr 10th 2019, 1:21 PM

    @Shane Corry: where in that thread is it resolved? The guy once spent 26 days in an airport due to a similar issue. It’s understandable that he would be agitated.

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    Mute Dave O'Keeffe
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    Apr 10th 2019, 5:37 PM

    @Neil Ryan: yeah, fu(k him, he said a naughty word!

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    Mute Neil Ryan
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    Apr 10th 2019, 5:41 PM

    @Dave O’Keeffe: Don’t get me wrong – I swear like a sailor! But as soon as you use it on a public forum, you lose the higher ground.

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    Mute Dave O'Keeffe
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    Apr 11th 2019, 12:00 AM

    @Neil Ryan: no you don’t, they’re words. Obviously staff on the ground were completely unhelpful to say he needed to go online while already in the airport.

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    Mute GRANjzT
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    Apr 10th 2019, 12:45 PM

    This man threw his toys out of the pram like some moody teenage boy and started f-ing and blinding at some poor Ryanair staff member online who was trying to resolve the issue. In spite of this, they still resolved his problem and put him on the next flight with compensation. He didn’t deserve to get on their flights at all after that public foul mouthed tirade.

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    Mute Finn H. Schoyen
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    Apr 10th 2019, 12:49 PM

    @GRANjzT: wouldn’t you be angry if something like this happened to you?

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    Mute Coco86
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    Apr 10th 2019, 12:54 PM

    @Finn H. Schoyen: Yes of course but do you think he handled the situation correctly?

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    Mute John Horan
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    Apr 10th 2019, 12:59 PM

    @GRANjzT: maybe he is like the guy from the AIB story yesterday…the compensation only compounded the problem apparently

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    Mute Alan Scott
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    Aug 12th 2023, 7:54 AM

    @GRANjzT: I have seen a lot of foul mouthed words on Journal.ie over the years Journal mods done absolutely nothing about it.

    1
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    Mute conor Murphy
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    Apr 10th 2019, 1:13 PM

    The one thing I would love to know and it has little to do with this story and that is, what percentage of crimes are committed in this country by foreign nationalist ??

    58
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    Mute Karen Wellington
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    Apr 10th 2019, 2:17 PM

    @conor Murphy: it has nothing to do with this article. Maybe submit an FOI to Dept Justice

    20
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    Mute Rei
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    Apr 10th 2019, 10:36 PM

    @conor Murphy: why do you care? Seems plenty of Irish people commit lots of crimes abroad. Do you want those statistics too? Somehow I doubt it. You’re just looking for an excuse.

    1
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    Mute Candace
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    Apr 10th 2019, 12:54 PM

    Arab spring was a failure in the end, all it sprung was more misery.

    76
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    Mute Nicky O'Donnell
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    Apr 10th 2019, 12:35 PM

    No RyanAir. It was not your ‘handling agent’. They were your employees that you didn’t train properly, as per usual.

    43
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    Mute Noel Brennan
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    Apr 10th 2019, 12:33 PM

    I hope he won’t be waiting ten months for compensation from Ryanair, and won’t have to jump through hoops, like I was.

    28
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    Mute Toomasu Sumitsu
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    Apr 10th 2019, 1:17 PM

    People that work in airports aren’t trained properly. Lufthansa staff stopped my girlfriend from boarding a flight to Dublin because they thought it was in the UK and she didn’t have a UK visa. Ryanair regularly stop Taiwanese travelling too because they think they have to follow the same procedures as the Chinese. Generally explaining geography and visa rules overcomes the issue.

    21
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    Mute Mike Conway
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    Apr 10th 2019, 3:36 PM

    He should have been kept out.

    20
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    Mute Patricia Kiersey
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    Apr 10th 2019, 6:42 PM

    Iyad El Baghdadi is a well respected human rights campaigner. It is embarrassing that he had such an experience on his way to this country. How demeaning and frustrating it must have been, especially as all his paperwork as absolutely in order. No doubt he missed attending the meeting he was coming to participate in, since it looks as if there were no other flights until this evening from Berlin to Dublin. I welcome him here and I hope the rest of his stay will be fulfilling.

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    Mute PV Nevin
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    Apr 10th 2019, 1:14 PM
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    Mute Niall Sheridan
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    Apr 10th 2019, 12:40 PM

    Clowns

    6
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    Mute Kieran Cronin
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    Apr 10th 2019, 8:29 PM

    muslim brotherhood travelling to ireland for a meeting ?????

    6
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    Mute David Jordan
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    Apr 10th 2019, 8:41 PM

    @Kieran Cronin: Eh no, he’s a vocal critic of Hamas, who were established in 1987 by a group of Muslim Brotherhood activists.

    “So here’s me saying it again: Hamas is a destructive organization and its effect on the Palestinian struggle has been nothing short of a catastrophe.” – İyad el-Baghdadi

    https://twitter.com/iyad_elbaghdadi/status/1109886173537886208

    4
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