Kinahan mobster Ross Browning has received a boost despite the Criminal Assets Bureau stripping him of €1.5million assets this week.
The 39-year-old will not be prosecuted over allegations he had a fake passport for which, if convicted, he could have faced 10 years in jail. Browning was arrested last summer over alleged use of bogus papers after returning from Dubai. But the Irish Mirror has learned the probe has been dropped.
Browning had travelled to the UAE to meet mob boss Daniel Kinahan as part of his key role for the cartel.
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A source said: “Browning is under major pressure and it isn’t going to ease. The CAB case highlights the coordinated work to target him and other figures currently playing key roles on behalf of Daniel Kinahan here.”
In Wednesday’s High Court ruling Browning, originally from the Hardwicke Street flats area of Dublin, was described as “close and trusted lieutenant of the Kinahan Organised Crime Group”.
Browning has been pals with members of the Kinahan gang since the early 2000s.
In 2001, he was involved in a cash-in-transit robbery along with two men who later went on to play a serious role in the mob.
Revenue records from the following years show that he was employed as a bricklayer and that he was subsequently self-employed in the same occupation.
In Mr Justice Alexander Owens’ judgment this week, it said that “he was returning very modest earnings.”
In 2007, Browning attended the wedding of Christopher Kinahan Jr., the son of Christy Snr, highlighting how he rose through the ranks by then. He later attended Daniel Kinahan’s wedding in Dubai in 2017.
In the period of 12 months which ended on 16 February 2009, during which Browning had lived in Spain, he transferred over €40,000 from one of his AIB accounts to a bank account in Estepona of a corporation associated with Daniel Kinahan.
CAB established this related to a property purchase in Brazil.
The following year, while still in Spain, his residence was searched as part of an operation relating to the Kinahans and a handgun was recovered.
As revealed by the Irish Mirror/The Star last year, prosecutors over there are seeking a sentence of two years, nine months and one day for Browning for alleged illegal arms possession.
The CAB case also revealed how Browning had a close and long association with Stephen Fowler, who is serving a prison sentence for feud related activity.
They once ran a concrete laying business together and Fowler’s son Eric, who was murdered in December 2018, acted as a debt collector for Ross Browning.
In his judgement, Mr Justice Owens said: “The evidence tendered on behalf of the Bureau establishes as a matter of probability that Ross Browning has had an ongoing significant involvement in organised crime for a number of years and is a senior member of the Kinahan organised crime gang.
“This transnational gang is involved in importation and distribution of drugs and firearms in Ireland.
“Ross Browning has associations with Daniel Kinahan and other senior members of the Kinahan organised crime gang and of the Byrne gang. The Byrne gang is a subset of the Kinahan gang.”
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