The Criminal Assets Bureau (CAB) has today sold two houses in Limerick it seized from the criminal gang member Kieran Keane Jr.
The High Court declared the properties, along with three cars and over €100,000, to be the proceeds of crime.
The houses were sold at auction today.
A three-bedroom house in Sarsfield Court was sold for €173,000, which was €73,000 above its advised minimum value, while another three-bedroom house at The Path in Garryowen sold for €168,000, which was €48,000 more than its minimum value.
It brings to €1.08 million the amount of money earned by CAB with the sale of four seized properties in the last two days; two houses in Limerick, one in Dublin and a commercial/residential property in Waterford.
The head of the Bureau, Detective Chief Superintendent Michael Gubbins, said the sales by CAB are designed to deny and deprive criminals of their ill-gotten gains.
Kieran Keane Jr is the son of feuding criminal gang leader Kieran Keane Snr, who was shot dead in January 2003.
The Keane-Collopy drugs gang was involved in a murderous feud with the McCarthy-Dundon criminal gang, which subsequently led to 14 people being shot dead between 2000 and 2010, before the main gang leaders were convicted and jailed.
Five people are serving life for the murder of Keane Snr after a man who was with him, who the killers thought they had also murdered after he was stabbed 17 times, survived.
Owen Treacy testified against them.
CAB say Keane Jr involved in organised crime
Like his late father, CAB said that Kieran Keane Jnr is involved in organised crime and has invested money in luxury goods, cars and houses.
CAB began a major operation five years ago which targeted his money laundering operation.
The bureau forensically analysed his finances and identified €696,000 worth of spending from unknown sources.
CAB discovered money had been spent on travel to Spain, the UK, Lapland and Dubai, as well as on gambling and plastic surgery at a clinic in Lithuania.
The bureau also identified a pattern whereby Keane Jnr acquired property but did not record himself as the owner.
The houses were then rented out to relatives or associates for cash and CAB said that he was the beneficial owner.
CAB seized the two houses in Limerick last year and sold them today for a total of €341,000.
The bureau told the High Court that Keane Jnr was involved in organised crime and associated with major criminals.
His only record of any income was €12,000, earned in 2015, but he managed to buy a burnt-out house in Caherconlish and sold it in 2018.
Mr Justice Alexander Owens said that some of the profits from the sale of the property comprised part of the €101,000 in a bank account that was seized by CAB and declared the proceeds of crime.
Some of the cash also came from a motor business that he set up.
Mr Justice Owens accepted CAB evidence that Keane Jnr was "a driving force" in organised crime and said it was like the criminal organisation was the source of funds used for all of these properties.
He no longer lives in Limerick and left Ireland five years ago after the bureau began investigating his finances, and lives in Spain and Dubai.
The judge also said that if Keane Jnr was in Dubai for a number of years, he must have money to pay his bills because otherwise he would be in jail.
His cars, an Audi A4, a Skoda Octavia and a Volkswagen Amarok, have already been sold and cash of over €101,000 has also been seized,
CAB said that it has taken over €500,000 worth of assets from Keane Jnr.
Two other properties sold yesterday
CAB sold two other properties in Dublin and Waterford for €745,000 yesterday.
A four-bedroom, three-bathroom house on Ratoath Road which CAB seized from the convicted drug dealer David Waldron sold for almost half a million euro.
Waldron, who is linked to organised crime groups in Dublin, could not credibly explain where he got the money to buy the house and other properties.
Mr Justice Alex Owens ruled the house on Ratoath Road which Waldron spent €633,000 renovating, was the proceeds of crime.
It sold for €490,000, €145,000 above its advised minimum value.
The High Court accepted that Waldron has been "a major player" since 2000 and that his main income was from drug dealing.
It found he was "heavily involved" in drug dealing and "has had access to large sums of money generated by drug dealing".
CAB also sold another property in Waterford it seized from a man convicted of aggravated money laundering and tax evasion in Sweden.
He was targeted as part of an international investigation involving CAB and the Swedish authorities.
The four-storey end of terrace building at O'Connell Street in Waterford city has a commercial premises at ground level and three apartments overhead.
It was sold for €255,000.
