Second Carey ‘default’ home is sold off for €550,000

Catriona Carey’s family home in Kilkenny has been sold for €550,000. e former Irish hockey star and convicted fraudster lost her house at the end of last year after defaulting on her mortgage for over a decade.

e sale of Carey’s former home went through in the last week of March. e loss of her family home has been described as “a bitter blow” for the Kilkenny woman.

One source said: “It feels like the walls are closing in.”

Carey, who is at the centre of an alleged mortgage scam scheme involving dozens of victims, had built up arrears of €359,000 on her family home. e 44-yearold had not made any mortgage repayments since November 27, 2012.

She was given three months to vacate last May when Start Mortgages obtained an order for possession after she racked up arrears of more than €359,000.

A stay was granted, meaning she had until August to vacate, but she left in October.

Start Mortgages took possession of the detached house at 2 Weir View Hill, Co Kilkenny, last November. e property was put on the market for €550,000 just one month after being repossessed. e sale of the house went through on March 24. e family home sale comes as investigators step up their probe into Ms Carey’s alleged mortgage scheme where dozens of victims have made complaints. e Corporate Enforcement Authority investigation is separate to another inquiry led by a team from the Garda National Economic Crime Bureau.

It is the second property Ms Carey has lost. A four-bed property that she was renting to a family, also situated in e Weir View housing estate, was sold for €365,000 via auction.

Catriona Carey was arrested in February by o cers from the Corporate Enforcement Authority.

She is suspected of scamming up to 30 people out of €400,000 by o ering to buy debt from mortgage lenders at a discount.

More than €200,000 deposited by homeowners into a business account was allegedly spent by Ms Carey on personal items, including a €55,000 BMW. An investigation last year exposed how other cash was spent on designer clothes and trips.

Vacant shop centre owner revealed

Better Value Unlimited was conrmed as the new owner of the Ferrybank Shopping Centre, which is currently sitting unused on the boundary between Kilkenny and Waterford.

e news was disclosed at the March meeting of the Piltown Municipal District at Ferrybank Library, according to the Waterford News & Star.

e building complex has been mostly empty since its completion in 2008.

Replying to a query from Fianna Fáil Councillor Ger Frisby, meetings administrator Michael Arthurs said that there’d been “no success” from NAMA in con rming the ownership.

on nher mental health state. In evidence, Ms Harty stated numerous complaints that she had made about her male colleague which began shortly after she had started working at the hotel in June 2021 were not addressed.

e WRC heard the behaviour began with inappropriate, lewd comments and went on to physical unwanted conduct, including blowing in her ear and grabbing her around the waist and wrists.

Ms Harty said she just froze and was in shock when it happened. She said the chef also whispered in her ear, blew on her neck and made totally inappropriate comments about underage girls.

On one occasion, Ms Harty said she was bitten on her shoulder. She said she had initially raised the matter informally with the hotel’s head chef and had asked in writing for the issue to be sorted quietly.

However, Ms Harty said she received no response from the hotel and made further complaints in July 2021 which were also not addressed. Eventually she said she was informed by the hotel’s head chef that the other chef “was gone”.

She subsequently met a senior director of the business, identi ed only as Mr J, whom she claimed was apologetic and said that he had known nothing about the alleged sexual harassment. Counsel for the hotel, Shaun Boylan BL, claimed it had not ignored the matter. e WRC heard the director met the chef again after he was the subject of further complaints in November 2021 which resulted in the chef leaving the hotel.

Mr Boylan said the hotel had placed her to work at the far end of the kitchen which was a signi cant distance away from the chef.

1,120 Covid deaths were in hospital outbreaks

Up to 1,126 Covid-19-related deaths were linked to acute hospital outbreaks, new gures reveal.

ese include 1,121 conrmed Covid-19 cases and ve possible cases of the virus. In all, 12,582 con rmed cases of Covid-19 have been linked to Covid outbreaks in acute hospitals since the beginning of the pandemic in Ireland. e gures emerged in a parliamentary response to Aontú leader Peadar Tóibín.

e Health Protection Surveillance Centre (HPSC) said the number of infected people includes a mixture of patients and healthcare sta . e number of Covid-related deaths associated with outbreaks in residential facilities up to February 19 last was 59.

Covid-related deaths associated with outbreaks in a mental health facility up to the same date was six.

e disclosure follows subsequent investigation from Kilkenny County Council Chief Executive Sean McKeown and Director of Services Denis Malone. Mr McKeown and Mr Malone studied the property register, and conrmed that Better Value Unlimited was the registered owner of the €100m centre.

Previously known as Better Value (2000-2015), Tacado (1995-2000), Dunnes Stores (1964-2000) and Dunnes Stores Limited, with a registered address at 46-50 South Great George’s Street in Dublin, the company was initially incorporated on March 9th, 1964.