Daniel Kinahan, Tyson Fury and the Irish Drug Cartel that Built a Boxing Empire - with Nicola Tallant

The Underworld Podcast

True Crime, Documentary, Society & Culture, History

4.6 • 871 Ratings

🗓️ 26 April 2022

⏱️ 50 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

For years, Dublin-born Daniel Kinahan built on the work of his heroin-lord father Christy, aka the Dapper Don, to become one of the world's biggest cocaine kingpins. Kinahan fostered some of boxing's brightest talents, including world heavyweight champion Tyson Fury via his Marbella, Spain-based promotion firm and gym, MGM. But in 2016 assassins came for Kinahan on his home turf, kicking off a gang war and sending his cartel into a tailspin. Kinahan decamped to Dubai (where else), and MGM's promotions became MTK...but it continued as the latest in a long line of mob ties with boxing going back to the Luccheses in NYC. Last month the US Treasury slapped a $5m reward on Kinahan's head. Soon after, UAE authorities froze his accounts. Now he's on the run—but his fighters are still going strong. How did one of Europe's top mobsters get such a firm grip on the boxing world? And will Daniel Kinahan live out his fugitive days on an Afghan compound? We spoke to journalist and author Nicola Tallant, who's reported on the Kinahans for years, to find out more. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Transcript

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0:00.0	At Barclays, we're here for the land of football.
0:06.4	We're here for the Premier League.
0:09.0	And the Barclays Women's Super League.
0:12.1	We're here for the football chance for giving more girls a chance. We're
0:18.0	here for the grassroots and all the muddy boots. From schools to stadiums, we're here for it all.
0:27.6	Barclays, here for the land of football.
0:32.1	It's August 2014 in Marbaya Spain, late night, and there's little noise outside the villa of Gary Hutch and Daniel Kinnahan, but crickets and the sound of former boxer Jamie Moore shuffling half drunk up the driveway.
0:46.0	More, a champion like middleweight from Salford, England, won 32 of 37 pro-bouts, a down to earth lad, a so-called fighters fighter.
0:56.0	He's best known for a brutal fight against compatriot Matthew Macklin back in 2006.
1:00.9	Fight of the Year in tons of magazines, a slug fest that won the hearts and minds of fans all over the world.
1:07.0	More is retired, but his former opponent Macklin back then wanted him in his own corner after the epic
1:14.0	battle and has brought him to the fame Macklin's Jim Marbaya or MGM to coach him
1:19.3	and other prospects for the big time. The MGM isn't just any other gym and not just for the long strips of bars on the Costa dell soul that attract hundreds of thousands of holiday and merrymakers each year. Its equipment is top of the range, coaches among the best in the world.
1:35.0	It does charity work and there's even an upstairs bar called Sontia where trainers and
1:39.6	powers can take the edge off after a tough day on the bags.
1:43.2	At the top of the MGM tree are Hutch and Kinnahan.
1:46.5	They're two millionaire boxing fans and promoters and all-round party animals whose large
1:52.1	es is murky to say the least.
1:54.8	They're often out on the town driving luxury cars and spending long nights at Slonja and
1:58.6	the strip.
1:59.7	More in his cleat know them simply as friends.
2:02.4	To others though, they're more to enemies.
	...

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