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A GROUP OF DEVELOPERS referred to as the ‘Maple 10′ or ‘Golden Circle’ who were allegedly given hundreds of millions in loans by Anglo Irish Bank to reinvest in the bank’s shares has been named for the first time in court.
The purchase of the Anglo shares by the bank’s top ten developers was allegedly intended to buy out Seán Quinn’s 10 per cent stake and bolster the bank’s share price.
A further six names – all members of Sean Quinn’s family – were also listed in court yesterday in the 16 fraud charges being brought against former Anglo finance director Willie McAteer. McAteer is accused of giving the Maple 10 and the six Quinn family members unlawful financial assistance for the purpose of, or in connection with, a purchase of Anglo shares, according to court documents.
So who are the so-called Golden Circle identified in court?
Developer McKillen recently estimated that he owes banks around €350m – including €300m to the IBRC, formerly Anglo. McKillen contested the transfer of €2.1bn of his loans from Bank of Ireland to NAMA. The Supreme Court upheld his appeal against the transfer on the basis that the legislation establishing NAMA had not been enacted at the time of the decision to acquire his loans.
The Menolly Homes developer, whose loans have been transferred to NAMA, featured briefly in the Mahon Tribunal. He told the Tribunal that the late TD Liam Lawlor had “plagued” him for payments and that he had paid IR£20,000 to Lawlor after the TD worked on persuading postal authorities to extend a postal district to include lands in west County Dublin where Ross was developing homes.
The McCabe Builders developer owes NAMA around€200m on foot of his loans from Anglo.
The Belfast-based developer owned PBN Holdings Ltd, which was co-founded in Northern Ireland in 2005 by Kearney and former Anglo executive Neil Adair. By the end of 2009, the property company owed over €370m in bank loans, including loans from Anglo, AIB, Bank of Ireland and Ulster Bank.
Maguire was behind the development of the Laurence Town Centre in Drogheda and owns the Carroll Village complex in Dundalk.
O’Farrell, of N1 Property Developments and O’Farrell Cleere auctioneers, owns the Northside Shopping Centre in Coolock, Dublin. A number of houses his company developed in Naul as ‘Delvin Banks’ were put on the market by NAMA earlier this year.
The Dublin-based developer behind Gannon Homes recently sold his K Club stake to business partner Michael Smurfit as part of NAMA’s asset selling scheme. He and Smurfit had bought the K Club for €115 million in 2005.
The McGarrell Reilly property group developer’s Anglo loans were taken over by NAMA in late 2010.
The Kildare businessman is a property and healthcare investor, and he founded the Mount Carmel Medical Group. The Commercial Court heard early this year that he owed AIB €226.6m at the height of the boom and had given a personal guarantee for €127.5m.
O’Reilly, of Castlethorn Homes, built the country’s largest shopping centre – the Dundrum Town Centre complex in Dublin. Homes he built as holiday houses at Killeen Castle in Co Meath were sold by NAMA under its deferred payment initiative earlier this year, with discounts of up to 80 per cent on the property from their 2008 launch price.
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Clíona Ward’s situation is hard to stomach. She’s lived in the US for decades, raised a family, contributed to her community, and had old drug convictions expunged under state law, which, in most cases, means the slate is wiped clean.
But seems like there is a catch; federal immigration law doesn’t have to recognise those expungements. So, even if a state court says it’s all in the past, immigration authorities can still use it against you?
That seems like a serious flaw in the system. Clíona has legal status, no threat to anyone, and yet she’s being treated like a criminal for something the justice system has already forgiven. It’s not just harsh, it’s unjust. If this can happen to her, it could happen to any legal resident.
And while the US plays fast and loose with its laws, we’ve got Trump McTrumpface floating the idea of rewriting the Constitution so he can waltz into another glorious term…free tanning lotion for everyone, just pay the extra tariff so he can settle up with his hookers and cover up for his cronies.
The absurdity would be funny if it weren’t so bloody real.
@Niall English: That’s what I said.
@Niall English: Donald J. Trump himself has a history of both drug use and a long time association/business partnership with a convicted cocaine smuggler, whom Trump went out on a limb for even during that smuggler’s trial. Look up David Cay Johnston who has spoken extensively and repeatedly about this…and despite Trump threatening to sue Johnston, Trump never has.
@Rafa C: before you went on a rant about Trump, feel better now ?
@frank dowling: Better? Not particularly. The fact I have to go on a rant about a man casually tossing around the idea of rewriting the Constitution like it’s a menu at Mar-a-Lago isn’t exactly soothing. But when legal residents like Clíona get treated like second-class humans while a former president flirts with authoritarian cosplay, I think a few sentences of frustration are the bare minimum.
You might prefer your news bland and buttered, Frank, but some of us still have a pulse.
@Niall English: Why has she only herself to blame. Is it because she is not a puritanical bore like you, living a holier than thou life. It must be great where you are, perched upon your throne, looking down upon those who have previously sinned.
@Rafa C: It’s the land of the corporations and Israeli lap dogs
As long as the Fanta Fuhrer and his ilk are there, they will never be free. They are in an dictatorship with a looney in the driving seat.
The people who voted for him must shoulder part of the blame too. Shame on you all!!
@Ollie Fitzpatrick: the Journal needs a special section for such low grade comments
@Ollie Fitzpatrick: “Fanta Führer”. Feel like I’m back in primary school with the level of maturity of people like you Ollie. How old are you 10?
@Ger Whelan: Trump is an empty, toxic person. Using dismissive and mocking labels for him is appropriate. He’s like a whirlwind of invective, scapegoating, scamming and vapid narcissism. Every so often that whirlwind stands still and Trump reveals just how utterly sad his response to existence is.
@Ger Whelan: Yeh the Coca-Cola company doesn’t want to be linked with that monstrosity, even the fictional land of Oompa-Loompa are up in arms as he’s been slapping on their patented shade of orange without permission.
Apparently, the Oompa-Loompa Council has launched legal action via Willy Wonka’s legal team, citing cultural appropriation, shade theft and crimes against mirrors. They’re demanding he return to his original colour, which sources confirm is the soft pink hue of unchecked ego.
Meanwhile, across the sea of delusion, the Constitution is being treated like a flat-pack IKEA manual, misunderstood, discarded and eventually repurposed as firewood for roasting the truth. Some folks are already queuing up for the next season of the reality show formerly known as democracy, where loyalty is measured in hat sales and policy is scrawled in crayon. The only thing being drained is the collective IQ of the electorate.
And somewhere in the background, Lady Liberty’s torch flickers, not from the breeze of freedom, but from the sighs of exhaustion.
@Eddie Nugent: You’d top the list!!
@Ger Whelan: US magabot!!
@Ollie Fitzpatrick: Why? Because I want supposed adults to act like adults? Wow brilliant. Grow up child
@Numinous20111: So because trump is bad it’s ok to act like children? Do you people ever listen to yourselves. Grow the F up lads.
@Ger Whelan: Tell me what good, sensible and constructive things he has done!!
@Ger Whelan: Listen to yourself, you are of similar ilk, you think everything you think is best and correct. You are a dictator whilst we are realists!!
@Ollie Fitzpatrick: So you believe acting like a 10 year old child in the playground is being a realist? Lord I’ve heard it all now. If behaving like a grown up makes me a “dictator” then it explains a lot about you lad. You must have hated your parents
@Ollie Fitzpatrick: 1) deported thousands of illegal alien murderers & gang bangers. 2) clearly defined how many sexes there are ( only 2- who’d have guessed?). 3) negotiating & fighting hard to wrap up that pointless conflict of death and destruction that has claimed so many young Ukrainian ( & Russian ) lives needlessly. ——- there’s 3 to get ya started!
@Mary Linton: 1) without due process, so anyone could be next. 2) how does this benefit anyone? 3) the war goes on and he’s not helped in any noticeable way.
@Ger Whelan: Who is most known for using childish name calling of his political opponents, or anyone who disagrees with him? Trump.
@Numinous20111: So Trump does it so that makes it ok. There was me thinking you wouldn’t want to be like Trump a man you supposedly dislike. But hey if you wanna be like him go for it.
@Ciaran Foster: 2. Women in sport for starters. They no longer have to worry about playing against biological males. Even the FA in England have finally banned transwomen for competing in women’s football. Long over due the nonsense that biological males could enter Female sports is coming to an end.⁹
@Mary Linton: Methinks you get your newsfeed from the Daily Maga or the Trump Times!!
@Ger Whelan: Everyone is out of step Ger except you. Get a life and look at the world through clear glass and not red, white, blue, stars and stripes glass!!
@Ollie Fitzpatrick: Since when have I supported the US. Jayses your something else. You now think me asking you to act your age means I support Trump?. You really are a child lad. Mommy or daddy needs to start supervising you on the internet
@Mary Linton: prove now many murderers and gang bangers he deported. Including the person with a tattoo badly photoshopped onto his image.
He was stopping both conflicts in hours but instead made it worse.
Larry Donnelly is always supercilious, sanctimonious and conceited individual. He affects this air of knowing political ambiguity while having the moral constitution of a liver fluke. Why he gets a platform on here I’ll never know. We can only hope that he gets detained by ICE: when he gets sent to Supermax he’ll probably try to order a curry and cheese chip
“Why he gets a platform on here I’ll never know”… really? you don’t know why?… *drumroll… advertising, which you’ve just contributed to
I don’t know. The gaf was formed on the back of slavery, genocide, and has always had deep institutional racism. This Cliona Ward situation is really pushing the envelope through.
@Pól Pot: Sure, the US was founded on slavery and genocide no argument there but let’s not act like that’s some unique American quirk. That’s more or less the world’s oldest blueprint for empire. The only difference is some nations wore powdered wigs while others just wore less shame.
Spain rolled into South America with crosses in one hand and swords in the other, turning civilisations like the Aztecs and Incas into footnotes. Ever wonder where all that colonial gold in Madrid came from? It wasn’t a bake sale.
France? Ask Algeria about liberty, equality and fraternity while under occupation. Ask Haiti how long it had to pay colonial “reparations” back to France for daring to fight for its freedom… spoiler: it took over a century and strangled the country’s economy.
Japan’s imperial expansion in Asia left behind a trail of war crimes so brutal, parts of China and Korea still can’t talk about it without spitting.
And then there’s the charming legacy of the Dutch in Indonesia, or the Germans in Namibia who pioneered concentration camps decades before the Nazis. The Herero and Nama genocide was a test run for darker horrors to come.
The point isn’t to excuse America, but to remind that the “civilised world” got that way by being extremely uncivilised. The real problem isn’t that the US was born of horror it’s that it wrapped the whole thing in Stars and Stripes, said “land of the free” with a straight face, and still pretends it invented democracy rather than just rebranded it with fireworks and fast food and a side order of any firearm you want.
@John Doe: Don’t mistake your free education on The Journal as a meltdown. Now go ask your mammy to make you a hot cocoa and go watch some cartoons.
@Rafa C: I’m not “acting like that’s some unique American quirk.” The article asks if she can still claim to be the “land of the free.” Cheers for the “free education” Thomas Aquinas.
@Pól Pot: Ah no Pól, the “free education” wasn’t a gift for you it was more of a general PSA for anyone pretending that the US cornered the market on historic horror. You’re dead right to ask if America can still call itself the “land of the free” I just added some global context to show that plenty of nations were built the same way, they just don’t have the same PR department.
Wasn’t challenging your point, just broadening the lens. But I get it, nuance doesn’t trend.
We can’t all work miracles, can we, Tom? You know that.
@John Doe: lol… Didn’t read it just laughed
@Rafa C: It’s all pretentious filler that isn’t relevant. Cockadoodle-dooooo.
@Rafa C: Beautifully put
Crime rates in Ireland could be greatly reduced by our justice department and media highlighted the implications of acquiring a criminal record.
@thomas molloy: How did you sort yours out??
The US just like Europe needs to speed up mass deportations of foreigners it’s the only thing that will save countries.
@Rian O’Callaghan: Exactly, and then finally the Natives will have their lands back after 500 years!
@Rian O’Callaghan: The reality is the earth has no borders, but I do enjoy watching how people react, you don’t have to be afraid Rian, soon enough the waters will rise around your sky pointing finger :)
Why don’t you do an opinion piece on this basket case of our government for a change !
US citizens are indoctrinated from a young age to believe that they live in the freest country on Earth, which is a bit of a paradox in itself.
Nothing will change that perception for many of them, not having the largest prison population on Earth, not being denied abortion rights, not being denied due process.
@John Doe: Plenty of people here would prefer you to be shot than innocent schoolchildren.
@Seamus Enright:
And yet it seems that you have no problem killing innocent babies ? Very strange way of thinking…
Once again the journal going after a foreign body while its own house is in a mess.
Lar lad , you made it quite clear ,you where at best wishey washey about US democracy, How the whatever did you get your job, oh I forgot the irish church likes everything but the truth
@Robert Halvey: you are a bit wishey washey yourself Robert. Remember the other day you were cheering on an elitest banker becoming pm of Canada? Seems you’ll happily sell out when it suits you.
@Ger Whelan: he worked very hard to become a successful banker. Unlike your hero who got Daddy’s slum landlord money
Of course it can. Just like it can call itself ‘Home of the brave’. From forcing immigrants into the army on arrival to murdering half a million Iraqi children on a lie it’s never been either but it can call itself whatever it wants. It can even call itself a democracy even though it fails at all pillars.
Was it ever the land of the free.
@Shaun Gallagher: more like the land of the freak nowadays.
There are decent Americans though, but what happens at government level these days is a real freakshow.
@Shaun Gallagher: the home of the depraved
“Don’t tred on me”… but do what I say lol!
It was never the land of the free. Just a delusional cesspit full of dopes and dullards.
Good riddance.
@Fergus O’Donnell: It played an important role in the international system and was a guarantor of sorts for Western freedoms. Those days have gone, for now at least.
No.
Overall, yes. Freedom is not freely obtained. It is fought for, constantly.
Nothing free about that country as it was built on stolen land
Don’t trust the system under Trump he’s not much of a president
Viva president Taco
American natives ,
You only have to remember what Trump types did to the Native Americans, after slaughtering them put them in internment camps ( called reservations )
have your say