The Indo Daily: The male model turned garda who became a spy for MI6

The incredible story of how former male model Patrick Crinnion rose through the ranks of garda intelligence, only to join a network of MI6 spies designed to infiltrate the Irish State. Host: Fionnán Sheahan Guest: David Burke

Patrick Crinnion was a Garda intelligence officer who worked for MI6 in the 1960s and early 1970s

As a high-up and well-trusted member of An Garda Síochána serving in core intelligence units, Patrick Crinnion was privy to the most explosive secrets of his day.

Before his ascension through the ranks of the gardaí, Crinnion worked as a male model. Thanks to his high IQ, he was also a member of Mensa. No ordinary man, in other words. Crinnion would eventually find himself standing atop the precipice of a world of lies and deception.

In this arena, loyalty could be bought and sold for the right price, and the British government seduced Crinnion to join a network of spies used by MI6 to infiltrate the Irish State.

He is alleged to have played a pivotal role in one of the most controversial sagas in the nation’s history: the 1970 arms crisis - a plot to smuggle weapons into Northern Ireland that became a hugely divisive political scandal.

How does such a man operate? Why did he switch sides? What made him so appealing to both British and Irish enforcers? And should Patrick Crinnion be remembered as a patriot or a traitor?

On this episode of The Indo Daily, host Fionnán Sheahan is joined by David Burke, author of The Puppet Masters: How MI6 Masterminded Ireland’s Deepest State Crisis, to look at an incredible true story fit for the silver screen.