Veronica Guerin murder suspect gets eight years jail for £10m kidnap plot

Patrick 'Dutchy' Holland, 68, a career criminal, was described by the judge as "thoroughly dishonest and villainous".

Judge Henry Blacksell QC warned Holland that he faced dying behind bars after his latest conviction.

At a previous trial in Dublin in 1997 shortly after Mrs Guerin was shot, it was alleged that the policewoman who had arrested him believed he was the killer.

Then, Holland was jailed for 20 years for possessing 10kg of cannabis resin.

After being freed in April 2006 after an appeal, he gave an interview denying any involvement in 37-year-old Mrs Guerin's death.

"I haven't killed anybody ever. There is no blood on my hands," he insisted.

Holland, originally from Dublin, named an Army marksman as the motorcycle pillion passenger who shot the crime reporter in 1996 as she sat in her car.

The Sunday Independent journalist, who left a husband and a child, had been waging a highprofile campaign against Ireland's drug barons. Her story inspired a 2003 film starring Cate Blanchett.

Yesterday, after a month-long trial, Holland was convicted of organising the plot to abduct London businessman Nasir Zahid using an attractive woman as a 'honeytrap'.

Khan Coombs, 24, was ordered to pose as a secretary and lure him to a 'slaughterhouse', Blackfriars Crown Court in Central London was told.

The scheme was foiled when detectives secretly filmed gang members and bugged their calls as they staked out Mr Zahid's office in Chiswick, West London.

The plan was allegedly financed by Patrick Van Cantfort, a foreign businessman dubbed The Banker, who was not before the court.

He is said to have recruited Holland, now of Lewisham, South London, to snatch Mr Zahid, whom he believed had double-crossed him. Two accomplices were overheard boasting of their potential ransom.

John McDonnell, a 45-year- old lorry driver, told Coombs: "We're going to send you into the office and you're going to flirt with this bastard to see if he'll ask you out - which he will.

"If he comes out, we're going to grab him and take him to the slaughterhouse.

"If this comes off, there's £ 10million involved in this job. You can ask Paddy - four-way split - £ 2million to go to The Banker and £ 2million each."

In co-ordinated raids, McDonnell, also of Lewisham, South London, Coombs, of no fixed address, Holland and Gerard Booth, 47, of Rostrevor, Co Down, were arrested in May last year.

They were convicted of conspiracy to kidnap.

McDonnell was jailed for eight years, Booth for seven years and Coombs for four years.