Mystery of Irish property tycoon found dumped on country road

Police on both sides of the Irish border are investigating what happened to Kevin McGeever, missing since June last year

A cross-border investigation is under way into the mysterious disappearance of an Irish property tycoon who has been found dishevelled and unkempt at the side of a road, eight months after he disappeared.

Kevin McGeever had not been since he was reported missing in County Galway in June last year, but was found with an insult carved into his head, long hair, unkempt beard and long fingernails on the Leitrim-Cavan border by a woman driving past.

He has since told the Irish police that he was abducted by three masked and armed men from his mansion in rural Galway in May. McGeever told officers that the kidnappers had demanded a ransom for his safe release, but he did not know whether one had been paid.

The property developer said he could not remember what had happened to him since, but, as he was being released, he was given a mobile phone and warned to keep it with him at all times.

The Gardai are now trying to establish whether he had been held across the Border in Northern Ireland before he was dumped in Leitrim.

Catherine Vallely discovered the missing man on Tuesday night. She was on her way home to Ballinamore with her partner Peter Rehill when they spotted him in the middle of the road.

"He had red trousers that made me think it was a cone in the middle of the road," Vallely told the Irish Independent. "When the man got into our car, he told us he had no shoes on. He said three men threw him out of a van."

The couple took him straight to Ballinamore garda station. The couple said he told them he had been thrown out of a van and was unable to tell what month of the year it was or what happened to him during his captivity.

"A female garda immediately invited him in for a cup of tea. As he was eating tea and biscuits, he asked her if she had any more. He said he hadn't eaten for God knows how long.

"He had a pair of enormous eyes in a very thin face and his cheekbones stuck out. He was rubbing his beard with fingers that had long nails. He was very well-educated, well-spoken and polite and articulate. He was just skin and bones," she said.

During the Celtic Tiger boom, McGeever ran an international property business selling luxury homes in Dubai to rich Irish and British clients. He is listed in legal proceedings before the high court in a case being taken against KMM Properties, which began in 2009.