Martin Foley is a well-known criminal with almost as many bullet wounds as convictions, writes Conor Lally, Crime Correspondent.
When Martin Foley was hit in a spray of gunfire in Kimmage, Dublin, on Saturday he told gardaí he was going to die. But as was the case with four previous attempts on his life it looks certain he will miraculously survive.
Foley, from Cashel Avenue, Crumlin, Dublin, first came to the media's attention in the 1980s as an associate of gang leader Martin Cahill, "The General".
Known as "The Viper", he has more than 40 convictions, some for assault, robbery and possession of threatening weapons.
In one case he assaulted a garda and broke his jaw, He was convicted in 1990 after his extradition from Britain. In 1988 he threatened a member of the force with a crossbow when he was followed to his home by gardaí after leaving a St Patrick's Day party in Cahill's Rathmines home.
In March 1984 an IRA gang broke into his house in Crumlin, tied him up and kidnapped him. He was rescued after gardaí chased the kidnappers' van to the Phoenix Park where Foley was freed after a shoot-out.
Gardaí believe the kidnapping was part of a row between Cahill and the IRA over Cahill's refusal to give in to extortion demands. Foley's name was once found on an IRA hit list.
In the second attempt on his life, in December 1995, he was wounded in the chest and arm after a gunman approached him at Fatima Mansions, Rialto.
In February 1996 he was again wounded in a gun attack, this time outside his home. His car was riddled with bullets by a gunman using an AK47 and an accomplice using a handgun.
He escaped by jumping out of his car and breaking into a house by smashing the glass with his arm before jumping through an upstairs window into the back garden and running through another house while being pursued by the gunman.
He was hit five times in the side and back and suffered a punctured lung. He also lost the tip of his middle finger in his right hand. He was later awarded £120,000 in compensation after it emerged in the Veronica Guerin murder trial that the protected witness Charles Bowden had loaded the gun used in the attack.
"He was a f**king eejit," he later said of his attacker.
"He was after firing 50 f**king rounds and he still couldn't get me. Sorry, it was 43 rounds, to be precise. It was an Ingram machine gun. That holds 50 rounds to the double magazine, so I have been told. I don't use the firearms."
In September 2000 he was again shot, as he left a swimming pool in Terenure College, but survived. In 2005 he took an unsuccessful High Court action to prevent a Sunday newspaper from printing stories which he claimed put his life in danger. The reports alleged he was a Garda informer.