Cornelius 'Naily Boy' Price: 'Vicious' Irish mobster linked to four killings and his final escape to Greater Manchester
31.12.2023 - 19:53
/ manchestereveningnews.co.uk
It was no ordinary funeral. Three top of the range Lamborghinis led the cortege to Rochdale crematorium.
Behind a large circle of friends and family, many of whom had travelled from across the Irish Sea, carried flowers spelling out the words 'legend' and 'king' . Other floral tributes included a golden handgun and a black pistol with silver bullets.
On March 6 this year, notorious Irish mob boss Cornelius Price was laid to rest in Rochdale. Price, a suspect in at least four murders, died a fortnight earlier after he contracted a brain disease in October 2021 - his final escape from the Irish Gardaí.
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It's thought he'd fled to the UK, where he had family links in Rochdale and Manchester, sometime in 2020 after a gangland feud in Drogheda, County Louth, had grown increasingly violent. Price began his rise through the ranks of Ireland's underworld in the early to mid 2000s.
But following the murder of suspected dealer Paul Reay, 26, who was shot dead through a car window as he made his way to court to face charges over a major cocaine seizure, a new generation of young Irish criminals saw an opportunity to step into the big leagues.
Ruthless Cornelius Price who was known as 'Nailyboy' and 'Ned', was one of those who moved into the void left by Reay's assassination.
He's said to have formed an alliance with a Traveller hardman, in partnership with whom he would take control of the north east Ireland drugs trade.
But their criminal activities soon caught the eye of the Gardai. The Irish Sun reports