Boss of gun-running ring smuggling assault rifles into Ireland gets 12 years

The leader a gun-running ring smuggling arms into Ireland from America has been jailed for 12 years after being caught “red-handed” in a garda raid during which parts for six assault rifles and hundreds of rounds of ammunition were seized.

Mark McCourt (34) of Edenreive, Newry, Co Down, was sentenced by the Special Criminal Court today having pleaded guilty in July participation in a criminal organisation’s efforts to import restricted weapons between February 2023 and July 2024, and possession of firearms.

McCourt told one prospective customer he would throw in 10 pipe bombs as a free gift to seal a €75,000 cash deal to supply guns and ammunition smuggled by air from America, a sentencing court heard earlier this year.

Detective Inspector Shane McCartan of the Garda Drugs and Organised Crime Bureau, who led an investigation into the gang’s activities last year, told the three-judge court in July that a firearms technician had been able to assemble 82 gun parts seized in a raid on a property in Co Louth last year into six assault rifles and a dozen pistols.

Some 1,200 rounds in 9mm calibre and nearly 400 in .223 were also seized from a shed in Ardee, Co Louth, where Mr McCourt and his co-accused were arrested on 19 July 2024, the inspector said.

It took the Garda Emergency Response Unit 15 minutes to get into the premises after the shutter was pulled down when officers attempted to execute the search warrant, the court was told.

Det Insp McCartan told the court he was “fully satisfied” that there was a criminal organisation in existence under the “control and direction” of McCourt. He said the function of the organisation was “the importation of firearms components from the USA to Ireland and the reassembly of these restricted firearms for onward distribution to other criminal organisations”.

Passing sentence today, Ms Justice Karen O’Connor, sitting with Judge Elma Sheahan and Judge Marie Keane, said the court was concerned with the fact that McCourt was “caught red-handed and with a degree of bravado”.

McCourt had been “nonchalant” in his references to weapons used by criminals to kill and execute “serious offending, including the institution of fear and intimidation”, she said.

“With no evidence of the court to any threat to him, he was essentially running a business, it can be inferred, for material gain,” she added. She said the arms smuggling offences were at the “top end of the scale”.

The court jailed McCourt for 12 years for arms smuggling on the basis of a 15-year headline sentence with mitigation of 20% for his early guilty plea.

He has also been concurrently sentenced to 10 year years on four firearms possession charges, reduced from 12-and-a-half years on the same basis. The remainder of the 20 counts on the indictment were taken into account.

At a sentence hearing in July, Det. Insp. McCartan said McCourt had already been identified in connection with the suspected importation of firearms when the defendant was arrested for something else on 24 May 2024 and had his phone seized.

Gardaí were able to extract data from the phone shedding light on the activities of the smuggling ring in the preceding year, along with conversations with prospective customers in messages on Signal, WhatsApp and Snapchat, the witness said.

Det. Insp. McCartan said McCourt and his co-accused both flew to Las Vegas, Nevada on three occasions in April and May 2023.

On April that year, following their return from the trip, McCourt told one prospective customer -- who used the alias “The Keeler” – “we got sorted this evening” and that it would take a few hours to “stick them all together”, the court was told.

“So get the cash ready lol,” McCourt added, before telling The Keeler to “get another phone” as a “burner”.

In further text exchanges with The Keeler, McCourt wrote: “€75k cash is [the] best price” and that he had “another man there for them today”.

He said the receiver of the firearms would need “a dry place like a hot press or that” as a “stash spot”.

“If they get damp, they won’t fire, that’s why you see boys there and they’re misfiring, because the gunpowder in the bullet is damp,” McCourt wrote.

He then added: “Tell them 75k and I’ll throw in the 10 pipes for free.”

Det. Insp. McCartan said: “It’s my belief that refers to pipe bombs.”

He said one of a number of videos found on Mr McCourt’s phone, which were screened in court in July, had captured a serial number on an AR-15 rifle made by Anderson Defence traced to a sale on 10 February 2023 at a shop called Parumph Guns and Ammo near Las Vegas.

“It was purchased by the co-accused on 10 February 2023,” the witness said.

As the videos were screened for the court, Det Insp McCartan said that what was being shown were “AR-15 assault rifles, military grade” and their magazines, including one “drum magazine” which could hold upwards of 50 bullets. A “significant quantity” of loose rounds was also to be observed, he said.

When a detective held up an example of one of the seized rifles in court, the detective inspector said: “Judge, it should be noted that all of the firearms had their serial numbers bored off.”

Prosecuting counsel Simon Matthews BL, said that after another trip to Las Vegas in May 2023, a text from McCourt’s phone to a prospective buyer under the alias “Vladimir Putin” said: “I can get an AR15 in 6.5 Creedmoor. It’s better than the 7.62; she’ll drop a deer at 900 yards, no problem.”

“Vladimir Putin” then asked about buying a “7.62 sniper” – and about the source of the weapons.

“We ram raid the place across the water,” McCourt replied, adding: “Yeah mate, don’t know, but I can get a price.

In another exchange stored on the seized phone, another prospective customer under the alias “Duff” asked: “Sweet bro, and if I need another AR [assault rifle] how soon can I get it?”

“That’ll be next month… but they’re definitely there to be got,” came the reply by voice note, which was played to the court.

In July, McCourt’s barrister, Brendan Grehan SC, sought “the maximum mitigation allowable” for his client and said he was instructed to “tender an apology on his behalf to the court and the State for getting involved in these matters, and also to his family and the shame he’s brought to them for this”.

He said his client was the father of two children, and that his fiancée and her mother were “standing by him”, and provided the court with letters of reference from local businesses which had used his client as a plumbing subcontractor.  

The court the defendant has some 42 previous convictions including assault causing harm, theft, and dangerous driving “on the high end”.

Det Insp McCartan said McCourt and was jailed for three years, with 18 months suspended, on foot of a conviction for a criminal damage incident in which he had gone to the home address of an off-duty garda at 2.55am and “rammed” her car.

Under cross-examination, he agreed with Mr Grehan that this period of offending was when the McCourt was aged between 19 and 22.

McCourt’s jail term has been backdated to the date of his arrest on 19 July 2024.