A CATHOLIC priest who denounced the brutal attack on former Quinn Industrial Holdings director Kevin Lunney has spoken of relying on his "survival techniques" after receiving news of a threat.
Fr Oliver O'Reilly, the parish priest of Ballyconnell in Co Cavan, took to the pulpit shortly after the abduction and torture of the 51-year-old businessman in September 2019 and condemned those responsible.
In an interview with the Irish Mail on Sunday, the cleric has revealed that after condemning "the perpetrators of this vile act" and describing them as a "mafia-style group" during a sermon at Mass, he received a phone call advising him he faced a threat as a result of his words.
Three men have since been jailed for the attack on Mr Lunney, who was abducted from outside his Co Fermanagh home and taken to a farm in Co Cavan, where he was tied up, beaten, and slashed with a stanley knife.
Mr Lunney was also doused with bleach and ordered to resign from his job before being dumped on a country lane.
Shortly after making his comments during the homily in 2019, Fr O'Reilly revealed he was installing security cameras at his parochial house and was intending to "take a back seat for a while" and making no further public comment.
In his new interview, the cleric reveals that after the homily he received a phone call telling him that he should "modify the comments" during his next Sunday Mass, and was told of the "clarifications" he should make.
"I got a sort of tip-off. Cars were being burned and I was told my car was going to be next. I took it seriously, so I put in security cameras at the house," he told the newspaper.
"The tip came from someone I wouldn’t know very well. This person would be in the know. They wouldn’t be my friend or an enemy of mine. They had got a tip that my car would be next…it was just advice and I would have regard for their advice because they knew there was a threat."
He said he refused to be intimidated however, but admitted feeling "nervous in my own home".
"If you work in the missions, like I did, I often feel you either sink or swim because you are in the wild, you’re on your own and you have to dig the deepest into yourself and you find survival techniques," he said, adding: "Well I did, thanks be to God."
Fr O'Reilly also said he was "disappointed" in the "hurtful" comments made by Sean Quinn's wife Patricia in the recent Quinn County documentary on RTÉ about the former billionaire's business empire.
Mrs Quinn described the priest as a "pure backstabber" and said she would "never forgive" the comments made in his homily.
Sean Quinn has always denied involvement in any form of intimidation or violence.
Fr O'Reilly added: "If you speak out on issues, you expect maybe some recrimination. It’s part of the job, it’s the risk in your job but to me I never referred to the Quinn family in any sense."
He added in his interview: "What happened to Kevin Lunney crossed the Rubicon, and there’s a point where you either stand up or you’re a coward."