The Irish Times revealed in a report by Colin Keena something that was obvious to anyone who has followed the endless deliberations of the Moriarty Tribunal [October 1997 to March 2011]—that the Tribunal’s star witness, Kevin Phelan, was not only a convicted fraudster, but also a blackmailer.

Keena’s report (The Irish Times, 15.6.27) describes a meeting between three people:  Phelan;  a businessman called Ken Richardson;  and his assistant Mark Weaver.  This meeting took place in York in February 2002.  The purpose of the meeting was to extract money from Denis O’Brien by threatening to show that Michael Lowry was involved with Denis O’Brien in a property investment in Doncaster.  The implication was that this relationship was a means of transferring money to Lowry for influencing the awarding of the mobile phone licence to Denis O’Brien’s mobile phone company.

The meeting was recorded surreptitiously by Richardson and The Irish Times reported on this recorded meeting in 2003.

Richardson was the owner of Doncaster Rovers Football club.  Keena also notes that Richardson had two criminal convictions:  one related to a race- fixing fraud in the 1980s; the other for hiring a man in 1995 to burn down the main stand at the Doncaster Rovers stadium.  Presumably the latter was both an insurance fraud and an illegal means to progress a legitimate development project. 

The idea behind the legitimate Doncaster project was to knock down Doncaster stadium and build apartments and retail outlets there;  replacing the old stadium with an out-of-town modern stadium. 

The idea behind the blackmail deal was to threaten to release documents to the Tribunal, journalists, and politicians.  These documents purported to show a business relationship between Denis O’Brien and Michael Lowry.  The purpose of the threat was to compel O’Brien and Lowry (their “friend”) to sell properties back to Phelan and Richardson at below market value. 

But what documents did Phelan and Richardson have that could embarrass O’Brien and Lowry?  The difficulty that Lowry and O’Brien had was that they both used Phelan as a land agent who in turn used the same solicitor:  a person called Christopher Vaughan. 

This might seem surprising, but Phelan comes from a very respectable family involved in the beef processing industry.  It is very understandable that Irish people investing in Britain would use such a person as a land agent.  O’Brien and Lowry were not to know that Phelan would exploit the connection between them for everything that it was worth!

The Tribunal reported that Phelan brought Lowry along to a meeting with Vaughan, ostensibly to discuss Lowry’s investments in Mansfield and Cheadle.  Somehow the meeting turned to the subject of Doncaster, which was a far bigger investment.  Phelan was involved in this project but not Lowry. 

We cannot be certain what was said at the meeting or why the Doncaster investment was discussed in the presence of Lowry but, after the meeting, Vaughan must have realised that he had committed a serious professional faux pas.  He had discussed the sensitive Doncaster investment with a third party (Lowry) in breach of client confidentiality. 

His way of dealing with this was to put on record the impression that was given at the meeting—that Lowry was involved in the Doncaster investment.  Accordingly, he wrote a letter to Lowry stating that he did not realise Lowry’s “total involvement” in the Doncaster investment.  This letter was copied to Phelan, the other person present at the meeting. 

Perhaps Vaughan hoped that either Lowry or Phelan would confirm Lowry’s involvement or, alternatively, explain that there was a misunderstanding (in the latter case Vaughan could claim that, although he had been indiscreet, he had acted in good faith). 

If that was the objective it failed spectacularly!  Lowry was probably perplexed by the letter, whereas Phelan must have felt that he had hit the jackpot!

Here was evidence from a solicitor that Lowry was involved in the Doncaster investment along with O’Brien.  Admittedly, the letter indicates that Vaughan hadn’t realised that Lowry was involved in the Doncaster investment until the meeting engineered by Phelan.  But, in an environment in which the Tribunal, journalists, and politicians were predisposed to suspect the worst about O’Brien and Lowry, any scepticism concerning the document was suspended. 

Once Phelan had obtained the documents from Vaughan, he leaked them to various media outlets.  It wasn’t long before the Tribunal heard of the allegations.  It requested that Phelan appear before the Tribunal.  But, since Phelan was not resident in the Republic of Ireland, the Tribunal could not compel him to do so. 

Phelan suggested that he could not appear unless he was shown documents that the Tribunal had in relation to the Doncaster deal. 

In an astonishing act of naivety, the Tribunal gave Phelan the requested documents!  Phelan said ‘thank you very much but still refused to appear before the Tribunal and allow himself to be questioned by counsel for O’Brien or Lowry!

When he received the documents from the Tribunal, Phelan claimed that they were not consistent with the documents that he had in possession.  In other words, he accused Vaughan of doctoring the documents. 

But overall, the evidence for Michael Lowry’s involvement in the Doncaster investment was quite flimsy.  Phelan decided that he would need the help of the other main participant (apart from O’Brien) in the Doncaster investment.  This is why he arranged the meeting with convicted criminal Ken Richardson.  If Richardson had denied any involvement by Lowry in the Doncaster project, the credibility of Phelan’s blackmail threat would have been undermined.  So, Richardson had to be “on board”.

The Irish Times was more than willing to facilitate the criminals.  In 2003 it published details of the Vaughan correspondence.  Keena also says that it was aware of the surreptitious video at that time. 

Keena says that Mark Weaver gave the copy of the video to the newspaper early last year [2025]. It didn’t publish then because Phelan’s trial for fraud was in process. 

It is difficult to understand the motivation of Weaver.  He surely could not have expected Lowry to give him “hush money”, since nothing new was revealed by the tape.  However, the timing of the release coincided with the formation of a new Government.  Michael Lowry was a key figure in its formation even though he did not become a member of it.  The personal attacks on Lowry by Pearse Doherty and other members of the Opposition was in danger of destabilising that Government.

It is noticeable that no attempt is made by The Irish Times to make sense of the issues raised!  Payments were made to Phelan, and the implication is that there was something improper about these payments.  There is no attempt to establish what these payments were for.

An example of this was a payment of £248,624 by Lowry to Phelan.  This is mentioned by The Irish Times in the context of the Doncaster investment.  But this payment has already come to the attention of the public.  The Irish Times was not the only media outlet that Phelan used in his blackmail scheme.  In 2013 he released a tape recording to the Sunday Independent.  (Ken Richardson was not the only one fond of making surreptitious recordings!)

The tape recording that Phelan released to the Sunday Independent is of a conversation with Lowry about this £248,624.  Lowry was not aware that the conversation was being recorded and is heard begging Phelan not to release details of the payment because he had not accounted for it in his tax returns.  But, significantly, during the conversation Lowry remarks that the payment had nothing to do with Doncaster but related to a property investment in Wigan.

In 2003 the Moriarty Tribunal was about to be wound down. The ‘revelations’ by the two criminals, Phelan and Richardson—facilitated by The Irish Times—gave a new lease of life to the Tribunal, thus wasting even more time and taxpayers’ money, as well as undermining confidence in the institutions of the State.

And yet The Irish Times is not embarrassed in the slightest by its role in this affair.  Indeed, quite the opposite!  It devoted a full page of its newspaper to this topic almost boasting about its journalistic “scoops”.

Nevertheless, Colm Keena should be congratulated for bringing to the attention of its readers the journalistic standards of The Irish Times!

John Martin

Irish Times: Past And Present, a record of the journal since 1859, by John Martin.  Index. 264 pp.  ISBN 9781-872078-13-7.  BHES 2008. €21, £17.50