Serious crash in 1978 as Liam was the first in a series of motoring offences

AUGUST 21, 1978 – An 18-year-old Liam Duffy seriously injures a 24-yearold university student when he crashes into her motorbike. She narrowly escapes having her leg amputated and suffers lifelong injuries. Though his birth name is Liam, Mr Duffy says he had adopted the radio name of Gavin the previous year.

JANUARY 1979 – Liam Duffy is convicted of a ‘reduced charge’ of reckless driving related to the crash. He is also convicted of driving without insurance and having no driving licence. By the summer of 1979, advertisements start to appear in the local press for discos he is running under the name Gavin Duffy.

SEPTEMBER 1981 – By now Mr Duffy has formally changed his name to Gavin. But his driving habits don’t appear to have improved. Three years after his first crash he is returned to court for fresh driving offences and is disqualified from driving for six months and fined when he fails to appear in court. He is also convicted of driving without a driving licence and insurance and having no tax displayed – and failing to produce these documents at a Garda station when requested.

OCTOBER 2, 1981 – Gavin Duffy appears in court in Drogheda after being ‘summoned on a series of motoring offences’. Representing himself he seeks an adjournment because his lawyer – his brother Pádraig – is at another court. The adjournment is granted and there appears to be no further mention of the case again. JUNE 17, 1985 – The negligence and personal injury case against Liam Duffy for the 1978 crash is concluded in the High Court and makes front-page news. Despite being a household name at this point no one associates the crash with Gavin Duffy. DECEMBER 1993 – Now aged 33, Gavin Duffy continues to drive dangerously. He is seen by a Garda overtaking coming to the brow of a hill ‘with absolutely no vision’ in his black Porsche. He was doing 73mph in a 40mph zone. He is fined for dangerous driving and speeding.

OCTOBER 2012 – In an article celebrating the importance of his local paper, the Drogheda Independent, Mr Duffy describes how the publication has chronicled his entire life from his early school days to the shame of being caught driving without insurance. ‘I was in court for driving without insurance,’ he wrote. ‘I had taken my brother Eamonn’s car when he was away.’

A search under the name ‘Gavin Duffy’ of the Drogheda Independent will uncover the September 1981 case as listed above, but it will not reveal the more serous matter of the crash he was involved in as Liam Duffy in 1978.