Gary Flynn given life sentence for murdering Seamus ‘Shay’ O’Byrne

This report is a localnews.ie summary based on public court reporting and records; sources are listed below.

Gary Flynn received a mandatory life sentence at the Central Criminal Court on 16 March 2016 after being convicted of murdering Seamus ‘Shay’ O’Byrne. Mr O’Byrne was killed at his Tallaght home on 13 March 2009.

Flynn’s address was given as Rossfield Drive in Tallaght. He had pleaded not guilty to murder. Following a trial lasting nine weeks, jurors deliberated for one hour and 40 minutes before finding him guilty. The proceedings were reported on 17 March 2016.

Mr Justice Patrick McCarthy ordered that the sentence run from October 2013. That was when police in Northern Ireland first arrested and detained Flynn under a European Arrest Warrant.

Alex Owens, prosecuting, told jurors that Flynn was not the shooter. The gunman, he said, shot Mr O’Byrne four times and then turned the weapon on his girlfriend, Sharon Rattigan.

Garrett O’Brien, whose address was Cloverhill in Bray, had been convicted over the shooting in November 2012. Eugene Cullen was convicted in March 2014 for helping to organise the murder. The report said Cullen had subsequently died in custody.