The Criminal Assets Bureau (Cab) had one of its busiest years last year, with taxes and interest collected increasing to €16.5 million from under €10 million in 2003.
Security sources last night said the value of seized cash and assets flowing into State coffers would increase this year as many of the first confiscation orders granted to Cab in the late 1990s expire.
This will allow for any cash frozen in bank accounts immediately after Cab was established in 1996 to be passed on to the Department of Finance.
Many assets frozen during the same period have already been sold, and the proceeds of these can be passed to the State this year when a seven-year freezing period expires.
New figures to be included in Cab's annual report for 2004, which has just been received by Minister for Justice Michael McDowell, also reveal the extent of Cab's activities last year under the Proceeds of Crime Act.
Under this Act those engaged in drug-dealing and other serious for-profit crime are targeted.
The full report will not be published until later this year, but details have been obtained by The Irish Times.
Interlocutory orders were granted to Cab by the High Court in respect of €1.7 million during 2004, compared to €71,000 a year earlier. This means the court gave permission for the bureau to take possession of cash and assets which it had previously frozen.
The High Court also granted interim orders to Cab to the value of just over €1 million, compared with €3 million in 2003. This means assets and cash have been frozen by the court.
Cab will now prepare books of evidence against suspects, and will return to the High Court seeking interlocutory or final orders.
The value of receivership orders increased to €2.3 million from just under €1 million during the previous year.
The figure of €16,408,649 for taxes and interest collected included income tax, corporation tax, capital gains tax, VAT and employer's PAYE/PRSI. Social welfare savings achieved by Cab more than doubled last year to €222,921, from €109,654 in 2003.
Last year the State realised the proceeds from the first two disposal orders under Section 4 of the Proceeds of Crime Act.
Under this provision Cab can go to the High Court and freeze cash in accounts or prevent the sale of assets belonging to individuals which it claims are, or have been, engage in for-profit crime.
After a seven-year period expires, any cash frozen is given to the State, and the proceeds of any assets frozen and sold can be passed to the State.
The first two such orders were granted to Cab in 1997 and expired last year, realising some €275,875 for the State.
One of the two orders which expired related to the assets of Brian Meehan, a member of John Gilligan's gang.
Around €100,000 has already been realised by Cab when it sold two apartments owned by Meehan. A number of similar cases are due before the courts again this year.
Meehan is serving a life sentence for the 1996 murder of Veronica Guerin. He is the only person whose conviction for the journalist's murder still stands. He was a major player in the extended drugs gang headed by Gilligan. He is serving his sentence in Portlaoise Prison.
After the murder of Guerin Cab was given unprecedented powers to investigate covertly the financial affairs of those it suspected of engaging in crime before seizing their assets.
Cab often serves tax demands against those who, while not convicted of any crime, find themselves unable to explain where they got their money.