TURNING THE TY-DE ON DANIEL

Boxer Fury's post thanking Kinahan led DEA to focus on stopping drugs cartel, NY article claims

- BY MICHAEL O'TOOLE and KIERAN CUNNINGHAM

AMERICAN law enforcement helped turn the tide against Daniel Kinahan after Tyson Fury thanked the cartel boss for helping him secure a massive fight deal, it has been claimed.

Respected American magazine the New Yorker claims in a piece on Kinahan that the United States Drugs Enforcement Administration was struck by the June 2020 social media post in which Mr Fury thanked the Dublin crime godfather for securing a later aborted multi-million fight deal with rival Anthony Joshua.

The magazine quotes Chris Urben, who was a DEA investigator probing the Kinahan cartel and other European mobs at the time of Mr Fury's video to his 5.7 million followers on Instagram, as saying it was a game-changer for international law enforcement.

"I remember having the conversation 'This cannot happen. This has got to stop," he tells author Ed Caesar in the piece on Kinahan, 48, published by the New Yorker on Monday.

The 11,300-word article says the June 2020 video was a decisive moment in the international fight against the cartel - which less than two years later would be hit with a massive sanctions programme by US authorities.

That scheme, unveiled in Dublin in April 2022, also saw Daniel, his father Christy, 68, and brother Christopher, 44, have $5 million bounties placed on their heads.

In the controversial video, former world champion Mr Fury AGENT Chris Urben went online to thank Daniel-who was trying to become boxing's Mr Fix-It - for securing the fights against Mr Joshua.

Speaking in a clip posted online, Fury said: "I'm just after getting off the phone there with Daniel Kinahan.

"He's just informed me that the biggest fight in British boxing history has just been agreed.

"Big shout out Dan, he got this done. Literally over the line. Two-fight deal" The two-fight plan later collapsed and Kinahan's plan to take over boxing suffered a knockout blow when the US authorities sanctioned the three men in April 2022.