Court hears counterfeit notes found in Offaly were 'movie props'

TULLAMORE Circuit Court was told that 720 counterfeit euro note held by a man in Edenderry were originally for use as props in a movie.

Judge Sinead McMullan imposed a 20-month suspended sentence on Lee Fennelly (34) The Sycamores, Edenderry after he had pleaded guilty to possessing the notes on December 2, 2023 at Fr Paul Murphy Street in the town.

Detective Garda Shane Hunter outlined how gardai noticed that a vehicle appeared to be interested in their vehicle at 8.36pm on the date of the offence.

The driver went to Greenwood Park and came out again and was signalled to stop on the street.

A search resulted in the discovery of a black Nike bag in the boot with 699 notes in it and the rest of the notes were in a wallet in the front console.

Gardai saw that the words 'prop copies' were printed on each note and Detective Garda Hunter said he understood they had been created as a movie prop.

Fifty-one of the notes in the bag had the words 'prop copies' covered up with Tippex while all 21 of the notes in the wallet, which Mr Fennelly said was not his “usual” wallet, had Tippex used to cover the words.

The notes were a mixture of €50, €20 and €10. €18,370 would be the potential value of the notes in the bag while the figure for those in the wallet would be €660.

Mr Fennelly told gardai he had bought the notes online through AliExpress about a year before and considered using them instead of chips when he would be playing poker socially.

While he considered attempting to pass the ones with Tippex on them he “chickened out because of the feel and the look of them” there was “not a chance” they would pass as real.

Suzanne Dooner, BL, defending, said Mr Fennelly was a native of Carlow who had been working since he was 17 having not done the Leaving Certificate.

After working at welding he set up a landscaping company and in September 2020 he suffered a brain haemorrhage which resulted in hospitalisation, an operation and him being out of work for two years.

That was a difficult time for the man who had two children in Carlow with their mother and a 20-month old child with his current partner.

He resided with his partner and her 85-year-old father and worked with a plant hire company having been a forklift driver at the time of the offence.

Ms Dooner said he earned €550 a week and paid maintenance towards his children in Carlow. He brought €500 to court as a token of his remorse.

Times had been desperate for him when he put Tippex on some of the notes because he was out of work and what he had done was an aberration.

The court also heard he hunted as a hobby and a hunting knife was found in his vehicle.

Handing down the sentence, Judge Sinead McMullan said the maximum term of imprisonment for the offence was five years but she set the headline sentence in this case at three years, pointing out that the notes did not seem to be sophisticated and the use of the Tippex was “haphazard”.

Because of Mr Fennelly's guilty plea, his record of hard work, his medical issues, the fact that he had a supportive family, had not come to garda attention since and brought €500 as a gesture, she reduced the sentence to 20 months.

Judge McMullan said she did not believe the threshold for custody had been reached so she suspended the sentence in its entirety for 20 months on condition the man entered a €100 bond to keep the peace and pay the €500 to the V-SAC support charity, as suggested by Offaly state solicitor Sandra Mahon.

The judge also made an order for the destruction of the notes but said the bag and wallet could be returned to Mr Fennelly.