Man with 32-year heroin addiction caught with €4,400 of drugs in Kinsale

A Dubliner with a 32-year heroin addiction was caught in Acton’s Hotel in Kinsale with a €4,400 stash of heroin and cocaine two years ago. He has undertaken residential treatment.

Judge Helen Boyle said that she would impose a four-year sentence on the 49-year-old Eamon Kane, but suspend it.

The judge did warn that the period of the suspension was long — at four years — and that if Kane committed any further offences in that period he could face a custodial sentence.

Kane was one of three people found in a room in that hotel on January 20, 2023, with the stash of drugs.

Detective Garda David Barrett said that he received confidential information of suspected drugs being located in the room where two people — other than Mr Kane — had booked in that day.

Gardaí arrived and found the stash.

The Sherrif St man pleaded guilty to his part in the drug-dealing crime.

Passing sentence last Thursday, Judge Boyle said the accused did what was expected in terms of the requirement to go into residential treatment.

The judge noted that the accused travelled from Dublin to Cork with €4,400 worth of cocaine and that he has a serious number of previous convictions, all of them related to the misuse of drugs.

Mahon Corkery, defence barrister, said that, in mitigation, the defendant signed pleas of guilty and saved the State the time and expense of a trial.

He said that Kane had been dealing with addiction for 32 years.

Det Garda Barrett said that Kane got a sentence of four years and nine months back in 2016 for another drug-dealing offence and had three other dealing convictions as well.

Mr Corkery said that the accused had twice been a shooting victim and had been subjected to a number of serious assaults as a result of his lifestyle.

His mother died when he was only four months old and his father had no role in his life, Mr Corkery said.

When Mr Corkery put it to Det Garda Barrett, at part of the sentencing hearing earlier in the year, he suggested that the accused had been co-operative when questioned.

The detective replied, “Yes, to some extent, he told us a story and we wrote it down.”

“And you don’t expect him in Cork again?” the barrister suggested. The detective replied, “I hope not.”