“Fun loving” forklift driver on temporary release jailed over possession of €90,000 in criminal cash

By Declan Brennan

A “fun-loving” forklift driver and convicted drug dealer has been jailed for possession of over €90,000 in criminal cash.

On November 23 last (2025), gardai set up a surveillance operation on foot of confidential information that Dubliner Clinton Byrne (44) was to take possession of a large amount of cash on behalf of a criminal organisation.

Gardai from the Garda National Drugs and Organised Crime Bureau followed Byrne taking a taxi to an underground car park in Fortunestown, Citywest, where they observed an unidentified man putting a bag in the back of the taxi before walking away.

The taxi was stopped a short time later on the N4 near Palmerstown.

A Lidl bag containing a large package of cash wrapped in plastic was found in the backseat footwell of the taxi, Detective Garda Ronan O’Reilly told prosecuting counsel Jane Murphy BL.

Gardai arrested Byrne. In his fourth interview, he provided a prepared statement in which he stated he was not a member of a criminal organisation, did not participate in any conspiracy and had no option but to bring money from A to B as he had a sizeable debt from another conviction.

In April 2023 Byrne was caught moving €280,000 worth of heroin at a place in Clondalkin and received a sentence of four and a half years’ imprisonment with the final six months suspended on strict conditions.

He was out on temporary release when he committed this crime, with his sentence release date on April 25 last.

Dt Gda O’Reilly told Ms Murphy that gardai did not accept Byrne’s explanation of events.

He later agreed with defending counsel Sarah-Jane O’Callaghan, BL, that it was reasonably possible that what Byrne said was true and that he was under pressure and had drug debts.

Byrne of Kilmartin Ave., Tallaght, Dublin 24 subsequently pleaded guilty to unlawful possession of €90,220 in criminal proceeds.

In a handwritten letter to Judge Dara Hayes, the father of two said he was on his way home when a man approached him, showed him a photograph of the home of Byrne’s mother and told him he had a job for him to do.

In the letter, Byrne states that he tried “pleading my case” with this man and told him he was “on the straight and narrow now” and his only priority was taking care of his family.

He wrote that he was told the job “was nothing to do with drugs”, that he was simply to grab “a small amount of money” and he would never see the men again after that.

Ms Murphy told the court that this version of events was never put to the garda witness and that it was in conflict with the State’s evidence.

Judge Hayes said he was reading it as an account of the point at which the pressure was put on the defendant.

Ms O’Callaghan asked the court to consider a Probation Service report which described Byrne as a “fun-loving”, “charismatic” man who used bravado to aggrandise himself.

Ms O’Callaghan said this behaviour got her client into trouble.

She said that in around 2020 her client became addicted to gambling and, later, cocaine and quickly accrued a large debt.

She said this led to him committing the drug dealing offence in 2023.

Counsel said her client was in the past “very anti-drugs”, having seen the effects of drugs on his own family growing up.

She said he had worked consistently as a forklift driver since he was 17 and was a devoted father.

Judge Hayes said the offending was aggravated by the fact that it was carried out while Byrne was on temporary release from custody and that he has a previous conviction for drug dealing.

He said he could take into consideration admissions Byrne made at the scene of the crime, the steps he has taken towards rehabilitation, his remorse and his personal circumstances.

He suspended the final year of a four-and-a-half-year prison term on condition that Byrne keep the peace and engage with the Probation Service for a year after his release.