Ireland's youngest ever person in a witness protection programme is still in fear for his life more than 15 years later.
Joey O'Callaghan was just 12-years-old when he was groomed in a drugs gang in Dublin after taking a job from the local milkman, Brian Kenny.
The job later involved delivering heroin to houses at night.
Kenny and Thomas Hinchon were later found guilty of murdering Jonathan O’Reilly outside Cloverhill prison in 2004 and Joey's evidence as a state witness was pivotal to their convictions.
Joey's story is the subject of a new book called "The Witness" by Nicola Tallant, Investigations Editor with the Sunday World newspaper.
Speaking to The Pat Kenny Show, Joey said he is still living an anonymous life in fear as he awaits Kenny's upcoming release from prison.
Growing up in Ballymun, he said he witnessed the emotional and physical abuse of his mother at the hands of his father.
He said his mother worked three jobs to try and support Joey and his five siblings, and eventually, four of them, Joey, his mother and two sisters, moved to the UK for a "fresh start" away from his father.
Joey came back to Ballymun where he says he began to see a lot of the drugs and the "pandemic of heroin".
His father was anti-drugs and very strict but never physically abusive, Joey said.
He said: "I was lucky because I was Dad's youngest child, I had a great relationship with him.
"He never harmed me, he never hit me, though he was an alcoholic, he was still a good father."
Heroin through a letterbox
Joey said it was "like Christmas" when he initially got the job with Kenny as a runner for the milk float after getting suspended from school.
A few weeks in, he was then involved in delivering heroin to homes at night and Kenny's attitude turned aggressive.
On his first time delivering heroin through a letterbox he said: "I didn't know what was after happening, my world caved in.
"I went home and I was lying on my bed and I was thinking, 'I'm just after putting drugs through somebody's door', I didn't know if some fella was going to take them and die, or if my Ma was going to find out."
He said after he made the delivery for the first time, Kenny started making threats that he would set up his mother or sister with heroin.
"Straightaway I felt trapped, once I had done it for the first time I felt I had no other option but to keep doing it.
He said from then on he was doing daily deliveries of heroin or cocaine and was going to Ballymun every day to sell bags of drugs.
Kenny started abusing Joey a few weeks into delivering the milk.
Joey said: "He started giving me cocaine and tablets so I was constantly on an adrenaline rush."
He said he would pick up "kilos of drugs" on a motorbike which would be strapped to his body.
He lived in Kenny's attic and would come back and start bagging the drugs there or would collect cars that came from the UK filled with narcotics.
Murder
It was when he was in the attic weighing drugs that Joey learned that Kenny and Hinchon came back to the house and asked him to burn their clothes.
Kenny told Joey to bury a gun in the field.
Joey said: "It was when I came back to the house they told me they were after shooting a fella, they presumed he was dead."
He checked Teletext and the news came up that a man had been shot and killed outside Cloverhill prison.
He said: "When I told them that it was just horrendous, they were clapping and cheering and jumping up and down and I couldn't believe what I was seeing."
"It was a joke to them and I was in shock."
Joey said Kenny used to claim that he had friends in the Gardaí so he went to his mother following the murder rather than initially reporting it to police.
"The minute I knew they'd killed Jonathan, something just changed.
"The way Kenny had hurt me and the things he'd done to me, it can either consume you or harden you.
"I had accepted that I wasn't in control and I thought, either way, I'm probably going to end up dead myself and I'm going to end up in the field.
Joey said that after they told him about the murder, they said they would "blow his head off" or kill his family if he told anyone about it.
He went to his mother and then to the Gardaí to make a statement and give them the gun.
Joey had to testify against Kenny and Hinchon twice, during which people were calling him a "rat" and drug dealers from across Dublin gathered in court to intimidate him.
He said the murder had "crossed the line".
"I couldn't sit back and not do anything, I had to do the right thing and I don't regret it."
Witness protection
Joey said there was a perception that when he reported the murder he had done so with the intention of making a deal on avoiding conviction, but says he did it as "it was the right thing to do".
He said: "I didn't understand the implications of the witness protection programme and that's the only thing I regret.
"I regret how I was treated and how I was let down, the promises that were made and how I didn't get the right support.
"To this day, Brian Kenny has been out of jail 13/14 times and I haven't seen my daughter or mother 13/14 times in 16 years."
Joey said that he was "destitute" after leaving the country and entering witness protection at the age of 19.
He said: "I didn't cope, I was destitute, I prayed every day and got on my knees and begged someone to help me.
"I did drugs, I drank, I took tablets.
"I've done the sentence with them, I've been locked in a room for the last 16 years, the only difference is I can open the front door and they can't.
He said he wouldn't be alive today without the support of his mother.
He added: "Every day for the last 16 years she told me I did the right thing."
Fear for life
Kenny is in an open prison and could be released within a year, Joey said.
He said: "He's going to come after me, I'm 100% sure of that.
"It's sad but I've accepted the fact I'm probably going to die with a bullet in my head.
"I know I've done the right thing and I can't change what I've done, but I don't regret it and if I had to do it again tomorrow I would."
Joey said he lives in fear and makes short term goals, including keeping away from drugs, maintaining a job and monitoring his mental health.
He added: "All I can do is continue to try to be a good person and live the best life that I can."
