Bullets and blarney: The Danny Butler saga

Danny Butler arrived in 1991, on the run from British police. He landed on his widowed sister's doorstep in Auckland's St Heliers with his older son, a boy in shorts, and his pregnant girlfriend, Bernadette Daly.

His sister let them stay but on her terms. Separate bedrooms - she was a convent-educated girl.

And so began the captivating story of New Zealand's first Irish asylum-seeker, a man who claimed to be on the run, in fear of his life.

When Butler was finally bundled out of the country in 1997, so much of his story was left untold. His case was entwined with intrigue, both political and personal. And there remained the question: was his life really in danger?

The first casualty of the Butler story was 20-year-old Daly. Butler's sweet nothings to her quickly turned sour when he told her she had to leave. His wife Colette was on the way from Belfast with their other son. Daly had no option but to pack her bags.

She had fallen in love after hailing a cab Butler was driving in Belfast. Falling for a married man - she often met his two small sons in the cab - meant she ended up in a tiny flat on the other side of the world, alone until her daughter was born.

When his wife arrived, Butler rented a house in Remuera for his family. Colette knew he was leading a double life but she, too, was blinded by love and ignored it.

The boys went to school and made good progress. Their mother took menial work. Butler never worked during his time here and kept both households - Daly went on to have a second daughter to Butler - on his wife's wages and taxpayer benefits.

He set about seeking refugee status on the grounds his name was on a terrorist bullet back home, but he was economical with the truth, as bail-jumpers are inclined to be.

It wasn't his first time to New Zealand. He had earlier visited his sister, a successful businesswoman, but there was no love lost.

Growing up, they were a close Catholic family living in a Protestant neighbourhood - a recipe for disaster in Northern Ireland. They were eventually forced to move, under threat of loyalist torching.

"I looked up to him as a kid sister but as I grew older I realised he wasn't like other people. He was a liar and a user and as a 12-year-old I once had to stand up to him when he started getting aggressive with our mother," says his sister, who asked not to be named.

She had ended up in New Zealand via Australia. She had been shipped out, at 17, to a relative in Sydney because her parents didn't want her to grow into adulthood in a divided city, but she was unimpressed and crossed the Tasman.

Her father, a merchant seaman who'd visited New Zealand, talked about how much he liked Auckland.

When his sister married in Christchurch in 1983, Butler wasn't invited, though his younger brother Tony was.

Tony's arrival meant it would be a day to remember.

Tony Butler lived in Windsor, just outside London, and, in cop-speak, had "previous". He had done time in Belfast for having an Armalite rifle, with intent to endanger life.

The immigration people at the border didn't know - but British authorities did. They told the Security Intelligence Service and it became a wedding from hell because at that time, Prince Charles, Princess Diana and Prince William were on tour.

Security chiefs feared Tony, 30, was here for a hit on the royal family. They arrested him at his sister's home in St Albans a few hours before a royal walkabout in Cathedral Square.

His father and mother, out for their only daughter's wedding, stood by in dismay. Then the story took a macabre turn. Some time after his return to Belfast, Tony was given "a Maltese kiss".

The IRA considered the attention in New Zealand was such bad PR he was set upon and his nose was bitten off. It couldn't be reattached.

A graft using skin from his head was all surgeons could do, leaving him grotesque. He was put out of his misery when loyalist terrorists shot him dead in an inner-city Belfast house.

But back to Danny Butler, who didn't have any direct IRA links but did have criminal convictions. In 1990, he and two others were charged with possession of ammunition.

Butler was sentenced to 18 months in prison.

He was freed on bail pending an appeal but didn't hang around to hear the court's finding (the appeal was dismissed). Instead, he jumped on a plane for Auckland with his lover and one of his sons.

New Zealand was led a right old Irish stepdance for six and a half years until the night he was placed on a flight out, with a police escort.

He had unsuccessfully applied for refugee status on the grounds that the Irish People's Liberation Organisation (IPLO) would shoot him if he returned. The reason why remains arcane.

The IPLO, terrorism bit-players but serious drug runners, had disbanded years earlier, reamed out by the IRA because of their drug links.

Butler's appeals to the Refugee Status Appeals Authority and the courts were eventually all dismissed. When an immigration official called to serve a final deportation order in November 1997, Butler waved him away with a small machete.

Soon police and the Fire Service had the street cordoned off, and journalists were swarming.

After a 10-hour siege, he agreed to fly to Dublin, where he told one newspaper he would have a "running chance". But, he said, "You will read my obituary. Say a prayer for us. We'll need it."

What has become of Butler since that dramatic departure? Things have changed - but he's still alive.

His family have long since severed all connections with him. His sister has no communication. His son Tony, a construction worker in London, politely refused to be interviewed as he didn't want to speak his father's name.

Danny jnr, who was with Butler the night he arrived in Auckland, did talk from his home in Galway city where he holds down two jobs and is married to a local girl. The couple have two small children.

After he and his father returned to Ireland, says Danny jnr, they were on the move for some time.

"I have no idea how many beds I slept in until I got my life sorted out and left him. But I've never forgotten my years in New Zealand and I would love to return and settle there."

He's quietly working on it and saving hard, hence the two jobs.

His father has matched up with Daly again and they are also living in County Galway with their two Auckland-born daughters.

If Butler's fears of an IPLO bullet were ever serious, they must have diminished. The former paramilitary has long since disbanded, discredited.

Colette is married to an American, living in Boston.

Galway isn't large but Butler and Danny jnr have never bumped into each other. What would happen if he knocked on the door and asked to see his grandchildren?

"I would call the police and ask for a restraining order," says Danny jnr, matter-of-factly.

For New Zealanders who helped Butler, time has given them the opportunity to contemplate. Father Terry Dibble, chaplain to the Marist Brothers in Ponsonby, was one of the first people the Butlers turned to for help. He knew Danny was a fugitive, and of his double domestic life.

"He was a survivor and I left him to his own devices. But I felt desperately sorry for the plight of his wife and two sons and did what I could for them. I admired how the boys achieved at school, despite their home situation."

John Mahony, who taught the boys at Sacred Heart College, found himself involved in the family's last days in Auckland and is still so scarred by the experience he doesn't want to talk about their time at school, probably the happiest days they'd known.

The story was played out in street theatre the likes of which is rarely seen here, sad as a temperance wake.


The Danny Butler Saga


1951


Born in Belfast, Northern Ireland


1972


Jailed for five years on charges of unlawful imprisonment and possession of a firearm.


1990


Arrested on charges of possession of ammunition in suspicious circumstances. Jailed for 18 months, but released on bail pending an appeal.


1991


Skips the country, bound for New Zealand with his lover and his eldest son.


August 1991


Applies for refugee status after New Zealand authorities uncover his criminal past and tell him they will not extend his visitor's permit.


October 1991


Butler's case is raised in Parliament by MP Ian Revell.


January 1992


Butler's wife and youngest son join him in New Zealand.


December 1992


The Refugee Status Appeals Authority rejects Butler's claim for asylum.


1997


Butler finally leaves New Zealand after losing cases before the High Court and the Court of Appeal.