Denis Joseph 'DJ' Carey, the former Kilkenny hurler who pleaded guilty to ten charges of deception in July, has been jailed for five-and-a-half years.
Carey, of The Drive, Newtown, Maynooth, Co Kildare, was sentenced this morning, Monday, November 3, in the Circuit Criminal Court in Dublin.
He had been remanded into custody following a hearing in Dublin on Friday.
The Dublin Circuit Criminal Court heard that Carey defrauded in total €394,127 and $13,000 from the injured parties over a period between 2014 and 2022.
€44,200 has been repaid, leaving €349,927 and $13,000 outstanding.
Judge Martin Nolan said during Monday's sentencing hearing that he “could not imagine a more reprehensible fraud than to tell people you have cancer and extort money on that basis."
While Carey pleaded guilty to ten counts earlier this year, a further eight charges of dishonestly inducing others to pay money and two counts of using a false instrument with the intention of inducing another to accept it as genuine were taken into consideration by the court, the Irish Examiner reports.
Judge Nolan noted Carey’s guilty plea and lack of previous convictions as among the mitigating factors.
The Journal reports that Carey’s sentence is made up of a four-year sentence for count 2 of the charges he pleaded guilty to, and a sentence of 18 months for count 3, to be served consecutively.
Carey is widely regarded as one of the greatest hurlers of his generation. A native of Kilkenny, he played senior inter‑county hurling from 1988 to 2005, making 138 National League and Championship appearances. As a player, he won nine All-Star awards.
Following his inter‑county retirement in June 2006, Carey continued to influence the sport as club coach, under-20 manager for Kilkenny, and as a selector for the county’s senior team.
He was charged in 2023 with 21 counts of fraud and forgery - 19 counts of deception and two of using a false instrument - as part of an alleged cancer treatment scam.
He was accused of fraudulently claiming to have cancer and inducing 23 people to give him money. The offenses are alleged to have taken place over a nine-year period between January 1, 2014, and December 31, 2022.
Among those defrauded are businessman Denis O’Brien, Owen and Ann Conway, Mark and Sharon Kelly, Aidan Mulligan, Tony Griffin and Christy Browne, Thomas Butler, Jeffrey Howes, Noel Tynan, and Edwin Carey. The scheme spanned approximately from 2014 to 2022 and involved ten victims across Ireland.
In July 2025, Carey pleaded guilty to 10 counts of dishonestly inducing people to pay him money after he fraudulently claimed to have cancer and needed finances for treatment.
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