KIDNAPPER IS RECAPTURED AS POUNDS 8M DRUGS RING SMASHED

A major drugs trafficking ring has been smashed and drugs worth more
than pounds 8m seized in a joint operation between the Garda and Dutch
police.

Senior Garda sources said the drugs were destined to flood the Irish
market.

Firearms found in the Amsterdam raids including handguns, a sub
machine gun and machine pistols, may also have been for intended for
Dublin criminals.

Irishman John Cunningham, convicted of the kidnapping of Jennifer
Guinness in the 1980s, was arrested by police in Amsterdam, and nine
people were last night being held at Dublin city centre stations after
a series of follow-up raids across the capital by the National Drugs
Unit detectives headed by Det Chief Supt Ted Murphy.

Accounts

Bank accounts here and in Holland are also to be examined.

The seven men and two women being questioned at Dublin city centre
stations under the Misuse of Drugs Act, can be held for a maximum of
seven days.

Gardai uncovered 20 kilos of cannabis with a street value of pounds
220,000 and pounds 12,000 worth of Ecstasy tablets in the Dublin end
of Operation Plover.

Sources last night said the operation and the arrests in Holland and
Dublin followed months of co-operation between the drugs units of both
police forces, and gardai had on occasions travelled to Amsterdam as
the investigation progressed.

John Cunningham was arrested at his Amsterdam apartment by police on
Friday. Two British men and a Dutch citizen were also taken in to custody.

Fifteen firearms were also located in searches of two premises in the
Dutch city.

Dutch police also seized 100,000 Ecstasy tables with a street value of
pounds 1.4m, 50 kilos of amphetamines worth pounds 600,000, and
cannabis with a street value of pounds 6m.

Gardai carried out nine searches across Dublin where 20 kilos of
cannabis worth pounds 220,000 and 1,000 Ecstasy tablets worth pounds
12,000 were recovered.

Escaped

John Cunningham was jailed for 17 years for his part in the Jennifer
Guinness kidnap in 1986 but escaped from Shelton open prison in
Wicklow ten years later.

Gardai only found out last November he may be in Amsterdam and a full
investigation by two police forces got underway.

Sources last night said any extradition proceedings in relation to the
Shelton Abbey escape would have to wait the finalising of the Dutch
court proceedings.

John Cunningham first hit the headlines for the kidnap of Jennifer
Guinness from her luxury Howth home 14 years ago.