‘A month ago I had ambitions to go back to those offices and sort out Quinn... but not today’
Intelligent, dark and wounded, Sean Quinn has a magnetism that throws people out of sync, writes Paraic O’Brien
IT was almost midnight when Sean Quinn called. We’d been sent over from Channel 4 News HQ, London to Ballyconnell, Co Cavan, to investigate the abduction and torture of business executive Kevin Lunney. The challenge for us was going to be explaining the background of the story to a British audience. That was going to be difficult indeed without an interview with Quinn. I’d reached out to him several times and every time it was a ‘no’.
Now, all of a sudden, it was ‘yes’.
On our last day in Cavan, my producer, our cameraman and I drove up to the wrought iron gates of Quinn’s mansion in Ballyconnell and were buzzed in. When we (eventually) arrived at the front of the house, the man himself was standing in the doorway gesturing for us to bring the car around the back.
We parked up, introduced ourselves and were led into an enormous lounge at the back of the house.
Quinn and I sat facing each other by the window as my cameraman set up his equipment around us. We were looking out across his private lake. Quinn was wary. He was sizing me up. The small talk was a little stilted. It eventually turned to Brexit, as all small talk does these days. From there we moved on to Boris Johnson, Jeremy Corbyn, Donald Trump, the UK and the US.
“What’s become of those two, once great, countries?” Quinn mused.
My cameraman pinned on our microphones, focused up and said: “Right, up to speed.” TV news crew code for “I’m ready, enough small talk, crack on.”
“Mr Quinn, did you know about, sanction or commission the abduction and torture of Kevin Lunney?”
“No, no, no,” Quinn replied. “I had no hand, act or part or no knowledge or no gain. I’d have no benefit of doing anything to Kevin Lunney.”
Everyone knows the background. Some 46 years ago, a young, ambitious farmer borrows £1,000 from the bank. He starts digging gravel out of the family farm outside Ballyconnell. He diversifies into cement. Then diversifies into almost everything. Over time Quinn builds an empire in a place where business empires are not supposed to exist.
Over time Quinn doesn’t just become the richest man in Ireland, he becomes a sort of industrialist deity.
Then, after betting millions on Anglo Irish Bank shares, the crash. The whole Quinn empire implodes and by 2012 he’s declared bankrupt. A team of ex-Quinn executives takes over what’s left and tries to rebuild the company. Quinn himself is ultimately excluded.
Around the same time the intimidation and harassment of the new executives begin.
Not long after the abduction and torture of Quinn Industrial Holding’s chief operating officer Kevin Lunney, the parish priest in Ballyconnell, Fr Oliver O’Reilly, delivered an explosive sermon.
“There is a Mafia-style group, with its own Godfather, operating in our region,” he said. Quinn would normally have been in the congregation — but that Sunday morning he wasn’t.
Back, under the chandeliers in Chez Quinn, I quote the excerpt from Fr O’Reilly’s sermon and simply ask him “is it you?”
“There is absolutely not a scintilla of evidence to back that up.” He goes on to say that a few days after the sermon he visited Fr O’Reilly to reprimand him.
“I said ‘Father, I’m very disappointed in you. You’re wrong, wrong, wrong, wrong’.”
I ask Quinn: “Have you considered suing anyone for defamation?”
He says he complained to the local Garda superintendent, but he won’t say whether he’s pursuing a defamation claim or not.
He seems genuinely hurt by the Fr O’Reilly sermon. In fact there are several times during the interview when Quinn appears vulnerable, giving off the air of a huge wounded tiger.
So, if he wasn’t involved in the abduction of Kevin Lunney, who was?
He says he doesn’t know but says local people are still angry about how the new directors treated him.
“Do you genuinely think, Sean, that they’re angry enough to abduct and torture a man? Do you genuinely think, in your heart of hearts, that is the calibre of the people who live around here?”
“I don’t think so, no,” he says.
“So, where’s it coming from?” “You tell me.” We change the subject. “What makes you tick, Sean?”
“I love winning.” The tiger was back up on its legs.
“When I was playing football, I liked winning [he was once captain of Fermanagh]. Playing a game of cards, I like winning [he’s still a regular down the local in Ballyconnell]. No matter what I do, I like winning.”
Is he still interested in retaking the throne? Does he want his old companies back? He says he doesn’t. I press a little. “Are you sure about that?” The eyes go steely. “I’m… telling… you, that a month ago I still had ambitions to go back into those offices and sort out Quinn group, a month ago but not today.” What’s changed? “Kevin Lunney… I don’t want to be seen as the beneficiary of abuse. Or of criminal activity. I don’t want it. None of my family wants it. And my family wouldn’t want me walking back in through the doors.”
After the best part of a week in the area, we have a fairly good idea who some of the characters involved in the abduction and assault actually are. It’s pretty much an open secret locally. But, we’re nowhere near finding out who commissioned it.
When the Quinn empire collapsed, Sean Quinn wasn’t the only one to lose out. A whole raft of smaller, subsidiary businesses did, too. Some of the people involved in those businesses still feel sore and have connections with criminal networks and militant republicanism. The whole ordeal is still very raw locally, particularly in the townland (near Killashandra) where Kevin Lunney was brought to and tortured. We were asked to leave the locality while we were filming there, for example, and ‘escorted’ out of the area. In other words there are plenty of people locally who might have motivation and the means to target QIH directors.
Back in the lounge, my interview with Quinn is coming to a slightly uncomfortable end. My cameraman is doing ‘cutaways’ — scene-setting shots. It occurs to me that one of the most striking things about the Quinn story is its setting. With Aghavoher Lough in the background, Quinn feels very much of this place. He’s rooted here in the North Cavan/South Fermanagh border. He’s the antithesis of the millennial entrepreneur and the global nomad.
He reminds me of a particular type of older Irishman — intelligent, self-made, dark, wounded. He has a magnetism that throws people out of sync. I find myself wanting him to like me. But I can’t really tell whether he does or not.
Paraic O’Brien is an award-winning correspondent for Channel 4 News
‘When I used play football I liked winning. And playing a game of cards I like winning. No matter what I do, I like winning...’