in custody Gardai continue to quiz five in connection with attempted murder of criminal Michael Brennan

Five people remain in custody this morning after they were arrested by gardai investigating the attempted murder of convicted criminal Michael Brennan last May. 

The five, including four men and a woman, were arrested during an operation in the area yesterday morning and are still being quizzed at various Garda stations throughout the DMR North Division.

“Today’s arrests are the first in the case to date,” gardaí said. “The investigation is ongoing.”

Brennan, who is in his 30s, was targeted in a downstairs room of the house at Cromcastle Drive, Kilmore, by a lone gunman in the incident on Wednesday, May 20.

Following the shooting, a source said: "Brennan is extremely well known to gardai but he is not suspected of being involved in the wider gangland disputes in that locality."

Brennan was jailed for 10 years in March 2010 for attempting to murder another man over a €200 drug debt.

He was convicted by a jury in 2009 of the attempted murder of James Egan and of possession of a sawn-off shotgun.

The jury heard that he was a teenager when he went to Mr Egan's home and carried out the shooting on April 29, 2006.

He was also sentenced to eight years for the possession of a firearm.

The sentences were concurrent and backdated to 2007, meaning he served nearly ten years in total before his release in 2016.

Brennan was rushed to Beaumont Hospital by ambulance for “non-life threatening injuries” and has since recovered.

A garda spokesman said those arrested yesterday - two men aged in their 30s, one in his 40s and one in his 20s and a woman in her 30s - are currently detained under the provisions of Section 50 of the Criminal Justice Act, 2007 and can be held for up to seven days.

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Online Editors