GERRY ‘The Monk’ Hutch has returned to Ireland for a few weeks – with cops now extra vigilant around the location he is staying.
The 60-year-old is understood to have flown home on Monday of last week after spending 10 weeks in Lanzarote.
He flew to the Spanish island on May 15 – one month after he was found not guilty of the murder of Kinahan cartel thug David Byrne at the Regency Hotel in February, 2016.
Hutch was expected to stay in Lanzarote, where he owns property, for the foreseeable future following his acquittal.
But reports have indicated he’s back in Ireland and intends to stay for a few weeks.
The Monk’s family base, where he had been residing after his trial at the Special Criminal Court ended, is in leafy Clontarf.
Gardai have been notified of his return.
Garda sources said officers have been advised to be extra vigilant in the area around The Monk’s Clontarf home, where he has been staying since he arrived home.
There is still an active threat to Hutch’s life but it’s believed he has not been issued with a Garda Information Message and the threat to his life is not considered as severe as it once was.
A source said: “Nevertheless he’ll be looking over his shoulder for the rest of his days and will still be taking all necessary precautions for his own safety.”
He had been hiding in Fuengirola before he was arrested in August 2021 and extradited the following month to face charges of murdering Byrne.
He was held in Wheatfield Prison for 18 months until he was freed when in April.
He was found not guilty following a high profile three-month trial.
Kinahan cartel member Byrne, 33, died after being shot six times at a boxing weigh-in event at Dublin’s Regency Hotel on February 5, 2016, in one of the first deadly attacks of the Hutch-Kinahan gangland feud.
At Hutch’s trial, the attack was described as a “meticulously planned high-velocity assassination” by a six-man hit team which left one man dead and two others injured.
STREET MAYHEM
It “sparked mayhem on the streets of Dublin” and resulted in a “series of callous murders”, the court heard.
State witness Jonathan Dowdall had claimed that Hutch told he was one of the six-man team but the judges rejected the evidence.
In their judgement, they found that there was a “reasonable possibility” the Regency attack was planned by his brother Patsy Hutch and that ‘The Monk’ stepped in, as head of the family, to try to sort out the aftermath, “particularly as his own life was at risk”.
The Special Criminal Court also found, beyond reasonable doubt, that “members of the Hutch family were responsible for the attack at the Regency and the murder of David Byrne”.
The Kinahan cartel attempted to murder Gerry Hutch in Spain on New Year’s Eve 2015, but he escaped.
The Irish Sun revealed a few weeks ago that following his acquittal Hutch returned to Wheatfield Prison to close his prison bank account and distribute what was left to the inmates left on that prison wing, including Jason Bonney, 52, and Paul Murphy, 61, who were both convicted of being getaway drivers.