Convicted IRA killer Eamonn Nolan, who murdered a civil servant in front of the victim’s three-year-old son in 1979, has been pictured canvassing for Sinn Féin by-election candidate Janice Boylan.

Nolan, who is a senior party official, spent 14 years in prison after he was given a life sentence for his role in the murder of Eamon Ryan during a bank robbery in Co. Waterford almost 50 years ago.

An image, posted by Sinn Féin councillor Daithí Doolan in recent days, appears to show the killer holding flyers with pictures of Ms Boylan and Sinn Féin leader Mary Lou McDonald alongside a team of party canvassers in Dublin Central during a by-election event this week.

In a post to X, formerly Twitter, Councillor Doolan shared the image of himself and six others taking part in a leafleting event in Dublin Central.

The long-time councillor said he ‘couldn’t think of a better way to spend my birthday than canvassing for Janice Boylan’ in the post alongside the image.

Cllr Doolan confirmed to the Irish Daily Mail that Nolan has been out canvassing with him this week.

He said: ‘I don’t know why people are picking on him. I mean, I don’t know at all. I just know him as a key part of Sinn Féin for a long, long, long time, [the party’s] former chair of Dublin.

‘He’s been around a long time… TDs, MLAs, councillors, some have a history. I don’t know why – I don’t actually know.’

When Nolan’s crimes were put to Cllr Doolan, he said: ‘I was actually, to be honest, unaware of that. I only know him as a being the chair of Dublin and stuff.’

Sinn Féin did not respond to a request for comment from the Mail last night.

Ms Boylan is currently leading the race to win a seat in Dublin Central, with a recent TG4/Irish Times opinion poll placing her at 21% of first-preference votes and 10% of second-preference votes.

Her biggest challenge to winning the seat, in the constituency of her party leader Mary Lou McDonald, is Social Democrats councillor Daniel Ennis who is on 18% of first-preference votes and 15% of second-preference votes.

Gangland figure Gerry ‘The Monk’ Hutch, an Independent, is in third position on 14% of first-preference votes and 8% of second preference votes.

Nolan was released from prison in December 1994 after he had been jailed for the murder of Mr Ryan, a Department of Finance civil servant and father, during a bank heist.

Mr Ryan was shot dead by the IRA in front of this three-year-old son in an AIB branch on Strand Street, Waterford city.

At the time of the raid, the victim was in Co. Waterford visiting his mother and went to the bank with his son while his wife, Bernadette, went shopping.

Mr Ryan was accosted by the IRA gang while attempting to leave the premises and was gunned down in cold blood, by a hooded man, as he lay prone on the ground.

Nolan and his co-accused Aaron O’Connell were convicted of Mr Ryan’s murder and jailed for life. Getaway driver Bill Hayes was imprisoned for nine years. Both men were released around Christmas 1994, alongside seven other convicted IRA personnel, following a decision by then-Justice Minister Nora Owen.

Since leaving prison, Nolan has served in senior roles within Sinn Féin, including as the party’s Dublin chairman and on its national Ard Comhairle. According to a post on the party’s website, Nolan recently spoke at a Sinn Féin event commemorating the 1916 Rising in Co. Westmeath in April.

He has also held academic positions at Griffith College Dublin, including head of academic programmes.

Mr Ryan’s family previously spoke out against Sinn Féin after the party honoured Hayes, who was jailed for nine years for his role as a getaway driver in the robbery.

At the party’s 2011 Ard Fheis, Hayes was presented with a special award for ‘outstanding services to Irish freedom’.

Hayes, who stood for Sinn Féin in the 2009 local elections, told the Waterford News and Star that same year that he ‘regrets’ the robbery.

He added: ‘There was a struggle on, and it had to be financed. One of the ways to do that was to rob banks.’

Former party leader Gerry Adams later issued a statement expressing his ‘deep regret’ about what happened to Mr Ryan.

Mairéad Bolger, the sister of Mr Ryan, criticised Mr Adams for claiming that she had given a ‘positive response’ to an IRA apology for killing civilians back in 2002.

She said Mr Adams’s expression of ‘deep regret’ would not bring her brother back. ‘There’s no way back. That’s the thing about murder,’ she said in 2013.

Last week, the Mail revealed that Ms Boylan, who was first elected as a Sinn Féin councillor in 2014, claimed fluoride had caused harm to her niece’s teeth in a debate during her first year on the council.

Dublin City Council debated a motion 12 years ago to request the Government take fluoride out of the water system, following lobbying from anti-fluoride campaigners.

Speaking in the debate, Ms Boylan, who was then a first-time councillor, said: ‘I myself have a niece who doesn’t eat sweets, brushes her teeth after every meal, and has had to undergo two extractions as a five-year-old under anaesthetic.

‘Now, if it’s not the sweets, and it’s not her diet and she brushes her teeth after every meal, then what is it?

‘It only, it only comes back to the fluoride in the water.’

There was then some snickering at Ms Boylan’s comments in the council chamber, before she added: ‘That’s my, my opinion, and I have a niece that had to have it done, it’s not bulls***.’

Asked since if this was still her position, Ms Boylan said: ‘At the time I was upset at the traumatic health experience of my niece. I was starting my career as a councillor and I have a lot more experience and understanding of public health issues today.’

In 2022 Ms Boylan had a spectacular falling-out with the party and her leader Ms McDonald, and quit Sinn Féin, before eventually being brought back into the fold and selected to run in the last general election, in which she failed to get elected.