KINAHAN CARTEL: Thomas 'Bomber' Kavanagh ordered to hand over £1.1m or face 12 more years in prison

A DRUGS kingpin, who ran the UK arm of the "Kinahan Cartel" has been given three months to pay more than £1 million of his criminal earnings or face 12 more years in prison.

Ipswich Crown Court today concluded that Irish national Thomas "Bomber" Kavanagh, 57, (top left) benefitted from a major drug importation conspiracy by a total of £12,235,047.

His gang imported drugs with a street value of around £30 million, by importing cocaine and cannabis into the UK, from Europe, within machinery delivered by legitimate logistics companies and carrying cash back.

Kavanagh's spoils included a half share in his £1 million pile in Tamworth, which was fitted with bullet proof windows, money from the sale of various other properties in the UK, equity in a property in Majorca, cash in banks and made from rents, designer watches and clothing, a family holiday to Cancun and about £40,000 seized by police during the investigation.

Kavanagh was jailed for 21 years at the same court in March 2022 after he pleaded guilty to conspiring to import class A and B drugs and money laundering offences in July 2020.

The Kinahan drugs Cartel is said to be run by Irish man Christy "Dapper Don" Kinahan, 68, and his two sons Daniel, 48, and Christopher junior, 44, who are based in Dubai.

In April 2022 the US department of State placed $5 million rewards for information that leads to their arrest and prosecution, branding them the heads of a major international drugs cartel.

His henchmen Gary 'Flash' Vickery, 42, and Daniel Canning were jailed for 20 years (reduced to 18 years on appeal) and 19 years and six months respectively.

Canning's sentence included five years for possession of a firearm to be served concurrently.

Judge Martyn Levett, who sentenced the three and heard the Proceeds of Crime Act (POCA) case, accepted that financial investigations by the police and CPS had found that the recoverable amount identified from Kavanagh's existing assets is only £1,123,096, which he was given three months to pay back or face further time in prison.

Today he made POCA orders against Kavanagh and Vickery giving them each the same time to pay the money or face extra prison time.

Separately, Vickery was found to have benefited to a total amount of £10,966,619, but only £ 109,312 was found to be available, and he was also given three months to pay or face two more years in prison.

The court heard Vickery's assets were assessed from money in bank accounts, a half share in a property in Lanzarote, where he was extradited from, vehicles, money spent on a wedding, holiday deposits, watches and a boat.

At previous hearings orders were made for Vickery to forfeit an Audemars Piguet watch worth £75,000, as well as just over 100,000 euros that was seized from a hotel room when he was arrested.

Kavanagh's home was jointly purchased with his wife, Joanne, sister of Kinahan associate Liam Byrne.

The couple jointly purchased the luxury pad for £565,000 after Kavanagh's Dublin home was earlier seized by the Irish Criminal Assets Bureau (CAB) in Ireland.

There is no suggestion Mrs Kavanagh had any involvement in or knowledge of her husband’s criminal activities.

Other assets that were seized during a January 2019 raid on the address, include designer goods estimated at £500,000, including about one hundred pairs of designer shoes, 120 handbags, 36 pairs of Armani jeans, Hugo Boss suits, Canada Goose and Moncler jackets and expensive watches and jewellery.

The £40,000 cash was also found stuffed in a sofa and in Moschino, Gucci and Chanel handbags.

Before being extradited to the UK from Lanzarote in November 2021, Vickery, had a limited-edition Sunseeker Superhawk power boat, which had featured in the James Bond movie Quantum of Solace.

Vickery and his wife Nicola O'Connor, who had no involvement in or knowledge of her husband’s criminal activities, were living in a stunning gated villa in Macher on the island.

In January 2017 Garda (Republic of Ireland police) made several arrests in Dublin with a significant quantity of firearms and Class A drugs recovered. This led to an investigation into Thomas Kavanagh’s drugs empire by the National Crime Agency (NCA). The investigation also included his associates.

On 2 October 2017, a consignment was intercepted by NCA in Dover, within which was found; 15 kilograms of Cocaine and 200 kilograms of Cannabis hidden within two tarmac removal machines. The machines had been adapted to allow for the concealment.

Vickery was arrested as a result.

On January 12 2019 Kavanagh was arrested at Birmingham airport as he returned from a holiday in Mexico

He was jailed at Stoke-on-Trent Crown Court in September 2019 for three years for possessing a 10,000-volt stun gun disguised as a torch, which was found with other weapons during the raid on the house.

In August 2023 Kavanagh and Liam Byrne, 44, and Shaun Kent, 39, from Liverpool, were charged with firearms offences in connection with an informant plot which was hatched while the former was in jail over the stun gun conviction.

Kavanagh later admitted at the Old Bailey that he had plotted to fool the NCA by saying in May 2021 that he had intelligence about where a stash of weapons from Holland was hidden buried in a field in Newry, Northern Ireland, in the hope of getting a lighter sentence in the drugs conspiracy case.

The firearms, seven machine guns, three automatic handguns, and an assault rifle and ammunition, were recovered by police, but the men had discussed the plot on the encrypted mobile phone system EncroChat, which was infiltrated by French police in April 2020, meaning the NCA had access to the messages.

In October 2024 Kavanagh was sentenced to six years in prison to be served consecutively to his twenty-one year sentence. Byrne was sentenced to five years while Kent got six years in prison.

Investigations found Canning only has 16 euros and 19 cents left in an Ulster Bank account in Ireland.

The CPS argued that he should be liable for the full amount of the drugs assessed at about £10.4 million, but his defence barrister Richard Craven Furlong argued he had a lesser role than Kavanagh and Vickery and had no shareholding in any of the drugs.

His defence argued he should only be held liable for various transactions into his various bank accounts that totalled around £145,000, about £80,000 of which he used to pay the rent on a unit where some of the drugs were taken.

Mr Furlong said he was not disputing that he played a leading role in the conspiracy, but that he had no ownership of the drugs or any shareholding in the "Kavanagh Cooperative".

Judge Levett said there was a "huge discrepancy" between the amounts.

The CPS argued due to the scale of the conspiracy involving "multiple importations" he should be found liable for the full amount.

Canning's POCA case was adjourned for further argument about Canning's assets and the case continues.

Kay Mellor, Head of Operations HQ at the National Crime Agency, said: “Thomas Kavanagh was the head of the UK’s arm of the Kinahan organised crime group, responsible for the importation and distribution of drugs and firearms, making millions of pounds in the process.

“He and his gang believed they were untouchable, but that proved to be their downfall. Kavanagh and Vickery will be behind bars for many years to come and now have to pay back more than £1 million to the state.

“We will continue to use every tool at our disposal to target, disrupt and dismantle organised crime groups, deprive them of their assets and ensure they face justice”.

Adrian Foster, Chief Crown Prosecutor, said: “Thomas Kavanagh and Gary Vickery are dangerous criminals in the organised gang world, importing millions of pounds worth of dangerous drugs on an industrial scale to the UK.

“This successful £1 million Confiscation Order demonstrates the prosecution team’s commitment to work across borders to strip organised criminals of their illegal gains.

“We continue to pursue the proceeds of crime robustly and will return them back to court to serve an additional sentence of imprisonment if they fail to pay their orders.

“In the last five years, over £478 million has been recovered from CPS obtained Confiscation Orders, ensuring that thousands of convicted criminals cannot benefit from their offending. £95 million of that amount has been returned to victims of crime, by way of compensation.”