How Monk stole a March on cops
HUTCH AVOIDED EARLIER CAPTURE BY FLEEING JUST THREE DAYS BEFORE WARRANT ISSUED
IRISH businessman and former television presenter Gerry Robinson has died.
The Co Donegal-born entrepreneur was 72 years old.
Mr Robinson was born in Dunfanaghy in 1948 but left Ireland in his teens to head for England with his family.
The father- of-four, who was married to Heather Robinson, spent a large part of his life in
England working with Matchbox Toys and Coca Cola.
He became the CEO of Granada Television in 1991.
Advice
He fronted the BBC’s
I’ll Show Them Who’s Boss in 2004 when he went into struggling businesses to try to turn them around using advice and mentoring.
In January 2007 following a similar format, he presented a three-part series, Can Gerry Robinson Fix the NHS? as he attempted to reduce waiting lists at Rotherham General Hospital.
His funeral takes place on Sunday travelling to Lakelands Crematorium, Cavan for a private family cremation service.
GERRY ‘ the Monk’ Hutch fled his Canary Islands bolthole just three days before gardai made a move to charge him for murder.
Security sources in Spain have confirmed to The Star that Hutch (58) got a flight out of Lanzarote on Sunday S March 21 – while gar gardai secured a warrant fo for his arrest from a court in Dublin on March 24. The Special Criminal Court issued the warrant to officers from Ballymun Garda Station investigating in the 2016 murder by the Hutch H gang of Kinahan as associate David Byrne at the Regency Airport Hotel in north Dublin.
It was the first step in the process in which a European Arrest Warrant ( EAW) was issued for the detention of Hutch in early April – but by the time the Special Criminal Court issued the Irish warrant, Hutch had already left Lanzarote.
The Star established that he took Vueling f light V Y3141 f rom Lanzarote to Malaga in the late afternoon of Sunday March 21 – and this photo (left) is of him and his wife Patricia after the Airbus A320 landed at the Costa del Sol airport.
But the fact that he left Lanzarote three days before gardai secured their Irish arrest warrant shows just how close they were to nabbing him – and has added to fears that Hutch suspected he was to be charged at the time of his dramatic flight.
The Monk was at the centre of a manhunt once the EAW was issued – and he was finally snared by the Guardia Civil in the Limoncello restaurant, in Fuengirola, on August 12.
Fears
He was extradited from Madrid to Dublin last month – then immediately hauled to the Special Criminal Court where he was charged with the murder of Mr Byrne, a key ally of mob boss Daniel Kinahan.
Hutch’s trial is set for October 3, 2022 – and prosecutors have set aside 12 weeks for the hearing.