Seven men who conspired to import over 600kg of cocaine worth an estimated €42m into Ireland will be sentenced in two months by the Special Criminal Court.
Three of the men were Filipinos on board a ship containing the drugs that travelled from the Amazon and docked off the coast of Co Clare.
Four others, with addresses in the UK, were part of "a landing cell" that was intended to collect the drugs via an inflatable boat and transport them to a location in Co Kerry.
The three Filipino men who arrived on the boat are 36-year-old Hanz Pangahin, 44-year-old Christopher Ampo and 29-year-old Feljon Lao.
The other four, whose role was to land the drugs, are 46-year-old Miljan Koprivica of Bollin Drive in Manchester, 31-year-old Conor Costello of Earhart Park, Madamsbank Road in Derry in Northern Ireland, 40-year-old Gary Monks of Amulree Place, Glasgow in Scotland, and 32-year-old Ryan Watson of Mailerbeg Gardens, Modiesburn in Glasgow.
All seven pleaded guilty to conspiracy to import drugs between 18 December 2024 and 15 January 2025 and were operating in "structured and organised" cells under the control of others.
Detective Inspector Padraig Boyce from the Garda's Drugs and Organised Crime Bureau told the court that a ship called the MV Royal was docked in the Amazon from 14 to 27 December 2024, during which time Pangahin, Ampo and Lao loaded between 400kg and 600kg of cocaine, with an estimated value of up to €42 million.
Det Insp Boyce said the ship anchored in the Shannon Estuary on 12 January. As it was sailing to Irish shores, Watson, Monks, Costello and Koprivica arrived into Ireland at separate dates after 6 January.
On 12 January, these men were arrested on a "RIB", a rigid inflatable boat, at Meenogahane pier in Co Kerry after collecting the cocaine from the MV Royal and dropping it to another location.
Their phones were seized and examined, which led gardaí to identify the MV Royal.
On 15 January, a team from Customs and Revenue working with the gardaí boarded the ship and arrested the Filipino crew, Lao, with Pangahin and Ampo two days later.
The cocaine was found in 24 bags secured in the front of the ship, which sailed under a Maltese flag.
Analysis of encrypted 'Encro Chat’ mobile phones seized from the men showed that Lao, Pangahin and Ampo were each to be paid Philippine pesos equivalent to the sum of €138,558, if the operation was successful.
Gardaí also discovered a WhatsApp group involving someone known as "Emaar Boss", who had a Finnish SIM card and claimed to be based in Dubai who was controlling the "cell" of three men on board the MV Royal, issuing instructions as to their arrangements to meet Watson, Monks, Costello and Koprivica in the RIB.
The four men, who were "the landing cell", were communicating with a person in charge known as "Albert", a pseudonym, who had an Argentinian SIM card.
"Everything they were doing was clearly under instruction," Det Insp Boyce said, adding that someone known as "Danny Greene" was also issuing instructions to the landing cell, sending them the coordinates of the MV Royal on 9 January, as the ship was sailing up the west coast of Ireland.
Det Insp Boyce said that messages from Costello to "Danny Greene" showed there were "hierarchical powers in charge of these cells".
The presiding judge, Ms Justice Karen O’Connor, said the men will be sentenced on 23 March.
