Business tycoon Sean Quinn admits wrongdoing in downfall of his empire

The Fermanagh man was speaking in a new three-part documentary by Fine Point Films for RTE, called ‘Quinn Country’.Quinn tied his fortune and that of his businesses to the fate of Anglo-Irish Bank, making big bets on the bank’s share price as it tumbled to disaster.

The state was forced to move in and begin the process of taking control of Quinn’s businesses. What followed were protracted legal battles, a campaign of intimidation and violence, culminating in the horrific attack in 2019 on his former right-hand man, Kevin Lunney, who now runs much of his former business empire.

Speaking about his decision to invest heavily in Anglo Irish, Mr Quinn said: "Other people in the office would have known we shouldn't have been doing it."

The beginning of the end was when he began to take money out of his insurance business to cover the debts thus incurred. "That was wrong, I shouldn't have done that," he said.

His children feel that he has given away their fortune, he added. "We have plenty of rows and I suppose they thought they were multi millionaires if not more and then their father gave it all away on them," he said.

In the end he fought a losing battle over debts of nearly €3bn with Anglo Irish Bank and the Irish courts.

In the first episode he said it was "beyond comprehension" that people who were his friends, staff and his neighbours would blame his family for being involved in criminal activity and for abducting Mr Lunney.

"They turn around now and blame us for being involved in criminal activity and abducting Kevin Lunney [which he strongly denies]," he said. "It's beyond comprehension that your own friends and your own staff and your own neighbours would do it to you."

Alan Dukes was chairman of the Irish Bank Resolution Corporation (IBRC) from 2008 to 2013 which bailed out Anglo Irish.

He described Mr Quinn as a man with an ego who saw himself as "not only above regulation, he's above politics," he said.