DUBLIN, April 30 (Reuters) - Gerard Hutch, named in a 2023 court case as the head of a well-known crime family in Ireland, will seek election to the Irish parliament in a by-election next month after narrowly missing out on a seat in a parliamentary election 18 months ago.
Hutch's name is among the confirmed candidates on the Dublin city returning officer's website for the May 22 Dublin Central constituency by-election for the seat vacated by former Irish finance minister Paschal Donohoe.
Hutch, better known as "The Monk", finished in fifth place in the four-seat constituency at the 2024 national election.
Analysts say he faces a potentially tougher task this time round with just one seat up for grabs and all the parties whose candidates were elected last time competing again. Hutch's surge at the national election also faltered when he struggled to attract vote transfers from other candidates.
"I think it's great to put someone in there with a chequered past. That's what we need in the Dail (parliament), you need change," Hutch told the Irish Times this week when asked what it would mean if someone with his past were elected to parliament.
"You need a man like me in there who can talk to the guy in the street."
Ahead of the 2024 vote, Hutch said he was running as he did not think the deprived inner-city community where he grew up was properly represented. Rivals saw his support as a protest vote.
He was identified as head of the Hutch family by an Irish court in 2023 when he was acquitted of involvement in a 2016 murder. He denies being the leader of a crime gang.
The Hutch drug trafficking gang was named by the U.S. State Department in 2022 as being locked in a turf war with the Kinahan crime group, also based in Dublin, that resulted in 18 murders in the previous six years.
(Reporting by Padraic HalpinEditing by Gareth Jones)
