Bail hearing set for today in Sean O'Neill Sr. weapons case
By ROSE QUINN, Special to the Local News
07/02/2008
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A bail hearing on weapons charges is set for today in federal court in Philadelphia for Sean O'Neill Sr.
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O'Neill Sr. is being held without bail in federal detention in Philadelphia, a spokesperson for U.S. Attorney Patrick L. Meehan's office said Friday.
According to the indictment, O'Neill, a citizen of the United Kingdom and former owner of Maggie O'Neill's Pub in Upper Darby, lied about his membership in an Irish terrorist group to obtain his green card.
A team from the Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives; Immigration, Customs Enforcement; and Pennsylvania state police raided O'Neill's home early Friday.
When they left, O'Neill, 48, was in custody. Also, a gun silencer recovered from the house was confiscated, ATF spokesman John Hageman said.
O'Neill Sr.'s arrest came two days after a Chester County judge freed 19-year-old Sean O'Neill Jr. from a juvenile facility, where he had been placed following a plea in the September 2006 shooting death of Sheridan's son, Scott.
O'Neill Jr. shot and killed Scott Sheridan, 17, at the end of an underage drinking party at the O'Neill home, a palatial estate that straddles Delaware and Chester counties in Willistown. The young O'Neill had been pointing his father's .45-caliber, laser-equipped pistol at others at the party before Sheridan was shot in the face.
Sue Sheridan was told O'Neill Jr. was present when his father was escorted away by agents, who used a battering ram to enter the home.
Charges filed against O'Neill Sr. include possession of an alien registration card procured by fraud; false statement; eight counts of using a fraudulently obtained alien registration card; illegal possession of an unregistered silencer; and illegal possession of a silencer without a serial number.
It won't bring back her son, but Susan Sheridan said Saturday she felt good when she heard the father of the teen who shot and killed him is behind bars on federal weapons and immigration allegations.
"I knew he was being investigated," Sheridan said, referring to Sean O'Neill Sr. "It made my day when I heard he was arrested, to be honest."
Many of the details disclosed in a 12-count grand jury indictment unsealed Friday had been kept under wraps, but Sheridan said she had heard the rumors.
"A lot of the things I had heard, they are now making sense," she said
Sue Sheridan, a resident of Arizona, recently spent time in the Philadelphia area, primarily to celebrate the graduation of her son, Keith, from Cardinal O'Hara High School. Though it was Keith's moment, Sheridan said she couldn't help but think about Scott, too.
"I never got to see him graduate," she said.
In addition to his mom and brother, Scott is survived by his dad, Joseph R.; a brother Brian; a sister, Heather Mazza; and a stepfather, Anthony Ambruso.
Scott Sheridan, like O'Neill Jr., was just days away from starting his senior year at O'Hara when he died Sept. 1, 2006. The shooting occurred in the early morning as an unsupervised Labor Day weekend party at the O'Neill house was winding down.
The handgun used to kill Scott Sheridan belonged to O'Neill Sr. Authorities said it had been stored between the mattress and box spring in O'Neill's parents' bedroom.
Susan Sheridan blames O'Neill Jr., as well as his parents, for what she perceives as a continued pattern of arrogance and protection of their son, regardless of cost or consequence.
Brian Sheridan, the victim's older brother, said the elder O'Neill deserved some of the blame for the incident that took the life of his brother. The gun used in the shooting had been left unsecured in Sean O'Neill Sr.'s bedroom, and he and his wife were out of town when the shooting took place.
"I think justice has a way of finding itself for this family," Brian Sheridan said. "I truly believe that it was (the father's) fault for leaving the gun in the house."
Susan Sheridan said Saturday she was "outraged" by O'Neill Jr.'s release.
O'Neill Sr. and his wife, Eileen, are the former owners of Maggie O'Neill's Irish Pub in the Drexel Hill section of Upper Darby.
According to the federal indictment, O'Neill Sr. served jail time in his native Northern Ireland in the late 1970s. He was 17 when he pleaded guilty to being a member of the Fianna na h'Eireann - the youth faction of the Gerry Adams-led Irish Republican Army.
The group was dedicated to the violent overthrow of British rule in Northern Ireland.
From his first visit to the United States to the present, authorities alleged O'Neill Sr. had repeatedly failed to mention an early conviction involving his IRA ties, both on documents required to enter and remain in the country, as well as applications to buy and carry firearms.
The indictments state a woman who claimed to be married to O'Neill initially applied to the United States Immigration and Naturalization Service for O'Neill to become a legal permanent resident of the United States.
That woman, identified only by initials U.J.B., is known to the grand jury, according to the indictment.
Guns removed from the O'Neill home by state police following the Sheridan murder included a Marlin Model 980 .22-caliber rifle, with an attached Parker Hale silencer, and a Ruger Model 77, the barrel of which had been threaded to accept a silencer. Weapons offenses filed against O'Neill Sr. at that time by state police were later dismissed.
Federal agents recovered a silencer Friday at the O'Neill home, according to ATF spokesman Hageman.
Friday's arrest was the third for O'Neill since his arrival in the United States in 1983. Haverford police charged him in 1983 for carrying a firearm without a permit. That case was also dismissed.
As for Sheridan, she'll be watching the latest case as it proceeds through the system.
For now, she posed this question:
"What do you need a silencer for?"
Staff writer Michael P. Rellahan and correspondent Susan Serbin contributed to this report.
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