Joe O'Connell (Irish republican) security wing of Portlaoise Prison, Ireland, in early 1998. They were presented by Gerry Adams to the 1998 Sinn Féin Ard Fheis as 'our Nelson Mandelas', and were released together with Brendan Dowd and Liam Quinn in 1999 as part of the Belfast Agreement. Joe O'Connell (Irish republican) Martin Joseph O'Connell (born 1951), better known as Joe, is an Irish republican and a former volunteer in the Provisional Irish Republican Army (IRA). He is most noted for having been a member of the Balcombe Street gang. O'Connell was born in Kilkee, in rural County Clare, 'a stronghold of Gaelic-speaking inhabitants
Tomás Mac Giolla at the local national school in Nenagh before completing his secondary education at St. Flannan's College, Ennis, County Clare. It was while at St. Flannan's that he changed to using the Irish language version of his name. He won a scholarship to University College Dublin where he qualified with a Bachelor of Arts degree, followed by a degree in Commerce. A qualified accountant, Mac Giolla was employed by the Irish Electricity Supply Board from 1947 until he went into full-time politics in 1977. In his early life Mac Giolla was an active republican. He joined Sinn Féin and the Irish