Daily Mirror (Northern Ireland)
Thug detained in £300,000 property
This weapon could be hiding many secrets and give police a great deal of information SPANISH POLICE SOURCE YESTERDAY
THESE are the first pictures of John Gilligan’s villa where police found a hidden gun which they said could be linked to Veronica Guerin’s murder.
He was living at the £300,000 four-bed villa, on a non-descript residential estate a 10-minute drive from Torrevieja town centre.
He shared the property with the new woman in his life following his split from wife Geraldine. The British national, who is in her late 50s and called Sharon, was the only woman held in the raids on Tuesday which were sparked by an investigation last year into a drugs smuggling gang allegedly led by
Gilligan.
Two of the other four held, including Gilligan’s son Darren, are Irish and the others a Spanish and Colombian man described by police sources as “mere employees” of the drugs baron. Police filmed the gangster, who survived a murder bid when he was released from prison, being ordered to lie on the floor and handcuffed.
He was led out to his garden so he could watch police dig up the gun which is now the focus of an investigation involving Gardai and Spanish cops.
In 2018, the Irish Mirror was on Gilligan’s tail when he tried to quietly fly to Alicante from Belfast and not the more convenient airport in Dublin.
A few weeks later he was arrested at Belfast International by the PSNI and found to be in possession of a large sum of cash.
He was subsequently charged with money laundering and held in custody for six months before the charges were eventually dropped.