Killer wore €10k Mission Impossible face mask
SLAIN gangland hitman Kenneth Finn wore a specially made Mission Impossible-style latex mask that cost around €10,000 when he pulled the trigger on Real IRA leader Alan Ryan, the Irish Mail on Sunday has learned.
The mask completely distorted Finn’s appearance and duped people into believing he was an eastern European hitman.
The 36-year-old, who had upwards of 60 previous convictions, was shot in the head while sitting in a Jeep outside a house in Moatview Gardens, Coolock, Dublin last Sunday. The hitman was on life support for almost two days with a bullet lodged in his brain but was pronounced dead earlier this week.
A source told the MoS that when Finn walked around his home area of Marino, Dublin wearing the mask, and no one knew him, he was happy.
‘Finn was tall with red hair, so the mask and wig completely changed him. He was a big strong lad and that’s why people thought “east European hitman”.’
Finn worked as an enforcer for a drug dealer and tiger kidnapper named by newspapers as ‘Mr Big’. Mr Big is the chief suspect in the ordering of the hit on Ryan.
However, despite the belief that Finn was the man who assassinated Ryan, it is not believed his murder is in any way connected to the Real IRA. It is instead believed that he
‘He knew it worked when friends walked past him’
was murdered over money. Finn had gotten ‘cocky’, was on drugs himself now, and owed a lot of money, it is believed. According to sources, the Ryan murder was precisionplanned.
‘The Real IRA leader had stepped on a lot of toes and was taking hundreds of thousands off dealers. Those that wouldn’t pay were shot,’ said a source. It was decided enough was enough. The gangsters went to the now dead criminal godfather Eamon Kelly.
He in turn approached the leadership of the Real IRA to ask them to stop Ryan. Kelly was told efforts had already been made to ‘rein Ryan in’ and that there wouldz be no retaliation if action was taken against him.
A source explained how plans were then put in motion to kill Ryan.
‘There was at least three cars left around the Coolock area with keys on them and a gun. One or two were found by gardaí but [there were] always at least three. Mr Big put surveillance on Ryan and tracked him to several girlfriends’ houses, including one down the country. Taxi men he knew spotted for him.’ It was decided Finn would be the hitman.
He was out of prison and technically unlawfully at large because he wasn’t signing on as he should have been at the prison. It is believed Mr Big secured the latex mask.
The murder of Alan Ryan in September 2012 was one of the most significant gangland killings of the past decade. Finn shot him dead in broad daylight at Grange Lodge Avenue in Clongriffin. After the murder, Finn went to the UK for a few months.
The leadership of the IRA later gave orders for Eamon Kelly to be killed so that their role would not be exposed. It was also ordered that the Dublin Real IRA be disbanded.