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Solving the mystery of the body in the freezer

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Solving the mystery of the body in the freezer
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Criminals

As McCormack came increasingly under surveillance by garda drug squad personnel, other criminals in his area were developing their links to Galway and muscling their way into a trade, which was largely dominated by gang bosses operating from bases in Clare and Galway.

One nationally known gang leader became a regular visitor to Galway while a gunman, subsequently convicted of a murder in Limerick, was the prime suspect for a substantial armed robbery in the city.

McCormack had fallen out with some of his acquaintances in Dublin and, according to gardai, spent some time living in rented accommodation in Galway in 2000.

However, he continued to move between the two cities and was also thought at one stage to have travelled to Spain.

This meant that when he disappeared off the garda radar for several weeks, it was not considered unusual.

But his family became concerned about his whereabouts in July 2002 and reported him missing to gardai at Coolock station. Concern for his safety grew in October 2003 when his green Opel Vectra car was located near Shannon.

But there were no further sightings and it was assumed that McCormack might have followed in the footsteps of a lot of his peers and based himself overseas. The discovery of McCormack's body in a plastic container at the rear of a fish freezer, off Henry St in Galway city on June 13 last, posed a logistical nightmare for gardai.

Since he was identified last weekend, local gardai have been liaising with members of the national bureau of criminal investigation from Dublin to piece together all available information on McCormack's movements over the past five years.

The frozen state of the body has caused additional problems and it has not yet been possible to pinpoint how long it had been stored in the massive fridge.

The fish supplier in Galway where the body of Paddy McCormack was found in a freezer.

The freezer was used by the nearby Mermaid Fishmongers shop in Henry St and its owner, Ali Jalilvand, made the gruesome find as he was tidying up the area in preparation for a hygiene inspection.

The initial post mortem by deputy State Pathologist Dr Michael Curtis indicated that McCormack died from head injuries, inflicted by a blow from a lump of timber, or another heavy implement.

Toxicology tests will now be carried out in an effort to find out more details about how and when the drug dealer was killed.

However, senior gardai believe the murder was carried out in or near the freezer, rather than the body being dumped there after the killing.

"It doesn't make sense that anybody would kill this man elsewhere and then decide to dump the body in a place where it could easily be found, rather than dispose of it in a remote area or in a lake," one officer said last night.

Detectives are working on the theory that McCormack was a victim of a local crime gang and are trying to build up details of those who worked in the immediate vicinity of the freezer over the past five years.

"The key to solving this mystery most likely lies hidden in this general area," the officer suggested.