Dwayne Mullan: Notorious drug dealer cleared of all domestic violence charges

Dwayne Mullan — a former boyfriend of Peru drugs mule Michaella McCollum — had faced a raft of domestic violence charges against another woman at Craigavon Crown Court.

But with no complainant to testify, prosecuting counsel Nicola Auret had to offer “no evidence” against Lurgan-based Mullan.

Judge Patrick Lynch KC then ordered the jury to find Mullan “not guilty by direction” on each of the charges.

Mullan, with an address at Dingwell Park in Lurgan, had faced 11 offences alleged to have been committed against his former partner on various dates between November 2021 and April 2022 — single offences of wounding, attempting to inflict GBH with intent, criminal damage and a domestic abuse offence.

In addition, he had also faced three counts of common assault, two of making a threat to kill “intending the complainant would fear it would be carried out” and two counts of false imprisonment.

The domestic abuse offence alleged that Mullan engaged in a course of behaviour that was abusive of another person to whom he was personally connected at the time and that a reasonable person would consider the course of behaviour to be likely to cause her to suffer physical or psychological harm.

It was alleged Mullan intended the course of behaviour to cause her to suffer physical or psychological harm or was reckless as to whether she would suffer physical or psychological harm.

That offence was created by new legislation on domestic violence.

The case made legal history last November when Mullan became the first person to have that charge, which carried a maximum penalty of 14 years in jail, elevated to the Crown Court.

Mullan, formerly from Dungannon, has more than 100 convictions, including for drugs and domestic violence offences.

He dated dancer Michaella McCollum for more than a year before she jetted off to Ibiza in 2013.

McCollum spent years in jail in Peru after she and Scottish friend Melissa Reid were caught at Lima airport in August 2013 trying to smuggle £1.5m of cocaine from Spain. Last year she featured in a Netflix documentary High: Confessions of an Ibiza Drug Mule.