Books
The Outsiders - Exposing the Secretive World of Irish Travellers (2006)
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The Outsiders, first published in 2006, uncovers the secretive world of Irish Travellers where prejudice, crime and a burning loyalty to family, clan and tradition have made the community stand apart.
Eamon Dillon investigates Irish Travellers and their worldwide drive to succeed - a hunger that has taken some Traveller gangs into the realms of fraud, bare-knuckle boxing and violent feuds.
From Bejing to London, The Outsiders reveals illegal operations by successful Irish Travellers, such as the Rathkeale millionaire Traveller traders, the Texan con-artists and the rogue construction workers who plague British and Irish home-owners. They have conquered racism and physical hardship to become modern day pavee princes.
The Outsiders looks at the another side to life as an Irish Traveller, where internal violence is a major problem and murderous feuds can claim the lives of innocent people.
Of an estimated 50,000 Irish Travellers worldwide, some will always refuse to bend to the rules of society because they are - the Outsiders.
The Fraudsters - How Con-Artists Steal Your Money (2008)
There are as many ways to earn cash dishonestly as to make an honest living. Fraud is now an international industry, with a shadowy underworld network in which everything from songbirds and garlic, to designer goods and medicines are faked and sold on.
The Fraudsters: How Con-artists Steal Your Money details the con-tricks, identity theft, and exploitation, deployed every day by an army of these hard-working fraudsters.
The con-artists come in all shapes and sizes; psychopaths who have no understanding of how their crimes affect their victims, the white collar grafters who like to think there are no victims if an insurance company is hoodwinked and then there are the fraudsters who stick to their flimsy stories even when confronted with concrete evidence of their crime. Billions have been stolen by highly-organised gangs of fraudsters, who sell unlikely tales through internet chat room and forums.
For some, the lure of illicit money is more potent than doing a day s work. Fraudsters pretend to be friends, a respected banker, or even a lover to win the trust they plan to violate. Arrogance, greed, gullibility and insecurity combine to make some people easy pickings for con-artists.
Gypsy Empire - Uncovering the Hidden World of Irish Travellers (2013)
Irish Travellers are hated and loved, idolised and shunned. Gypsy Empire charts the rise and fall of the colourful characters among a community that is also feared and misunderstood.
Among them are some of the world’s most prolific and gifted criminals. They can operate in any culture, their self-reliance providing any edge over other crime gangs. Prolific paving-scams crews amass hundreds of thousands of euro every month from unsuspecting householders in dozens of countries. They have orchestrated art thefts, created a bizarre black market in stolen rhino horns and cornered a lucrative share in the international market for smuggled tobacco. Such Irish Travellers are driven by the need to prove their status among their own, a powerful instinct epitomised by those who engage in brutal bare-knuckle fights.
This is a golden era for the Irish Traveller clans which are expanding and growing like never before, despite lethal internal feuds that can suddenly erupt. From the city of Darwin in the Australian tropics, to the US city of Baltimore and all over Europe, Irish Travellers follow a lifestyle that has resisted assimilation by the wider society. With a population the size of an Irish town, they have created a space in the public consciousness that is far greater than their numbers. Gypsy Empire follows the secretive Irish Travellers on the road to rags and riches.