A Dublin drug dealer has lost his legal battle with the Criminal Assets Bureau (Cab), which on Wednesday secured orders declaring three of his properties derive from or in connection with crime proceeds.
Mr Justice Alexander Owens accepted as “reasonable” and supported by “persuasive” evidence, the bureau’s contention that Cabra man David Waldron has been a “major player in the illegal distribution and sale of controlled drugs in Dublin since 2000 and that this activity has been the mainstay of his means, income and lifestyle”.
The judge said Garda intelligence is that David and his brother Christopher Waldron took over a “leading role” in sourcing and supplying controlled drugs in the Cabra area of Dublin after Eamon Dunne was murdered in April 2010.
Waldron and his wife, Charlene Waldron, enjoyed “lavish foreign travel” inconsistent with legitimate income up to his imprisonment in March 2015, said the judge.
The lifestyle resumed when he was released from jail, and they rarely used their bank accounts to defray ordinary daily living expenses, he said.
Ms Waldron “cannot but have been aware of the source of her means and of her husband’s means to engage in these activities”, the judge added.
The Cab has separately seized the Dublin home of Christopher Waldron and is due to auction it next Friday.
The bureau took possession of the house and some expensive watches from Christopher Waldron, of Killala Road, after successfully arguing in the High Court that he bought them through the sale of drugs in Cabra and Fingals.
In a ruling on Wednesday, Mr Justice Owens said the bureau alleged David Waldron has been “heavily involved” in the illegal supply and sale of controlled drugs since 2000 and that drug dealing has been his main income.
The Cab, represented by barrister Grainne O’Neill, persuaded him that the wherewithal for purchasing and discharging mortgage payments on properties in Finglas, Dublin 11, and Leixlip, Co Kildare, came from crime proceeds and not from legitimate earnings, savings or loans from friends. The Finglas property was sold.
A further house in Cabra, Dublin 7, was bought for €330,000 and extensively refurbished using crime proceeds, the judge found.
The couple now live in a large detached house in a rural area at Darview Heights, near Gorey, Co Wexford. The judge said the mansion was built in 2015 and 2016 while David Waldron was in prison.
The source of building and fit-out funds “remains unexplained and is most likely to have originated in proceeds of crime”, he held.
The judge made orders under section 3(1) of the 1996 Proceeds of Crime Act regarding the Gorey, Leixlip and Cabra properties, which remained in the Waldrons’ possession, declaring them direct or indirect crime proceeds.
The couple had contested the bureau’s case, which was initiated in July 2019.
The judge said evidence provided by the Waldrons is not sufficient to displace his provisional conclusion on the evidence from the bureau in relation to the three properties still in their possession.
The Cab’s evidence relate to David Waldron’s criminality and the absence of any plausible non-criminal explanation for the resources used to acquire and develop the houses and to finance mortgage instalments, he said.
Mr Justice Owens said David Waldron has numerous criminal associates, including his brother Christopher and another individual identified only as “JF”.
He has been sentenced twice to imprisonment, firstly in 2000 for possession of controlled drugs for sale or supply and secondly in March 2015 for violent disorder related to a planned attack in a pub in Cabra on a man who had accused him of shooting a cousin in a different Cabra bar, said the judge.
