Wife of Kerry man caught up with Mexican drug cartel vows to stand by him as he begins 12-year prison sentence.

In an interview with the Irish Mail on Sunday, wife Jackie O'Duffy McDonnell said a momentary 'madness' resulted in her 44-year-old husband Nathan McDonnell's entanglement with the Sinaloa cartel, one of the world's most feared drug-trafficking gangs.

Speaking a day after her husband was imprisoned at the Special Criminal Court for his role in the doomed bid to ship crystal meth from Ireland to Australia, the mother-of-three said: 'I'm devastated. The sentencing of a man you are in love with is awful. I am standing by him 100 per cent. 'But you know, I suppose now we know what we are facing, we can try and plan for a future. 'This was not in my life plan, God, no. It's a blow, it's what we've been dealt with. It is what it is.'

Ms McDonnell said her family now needs 'to come up with a plan as to how we move forward with this in a way that is beneficial for all of us'.

She added: 'I have to think about what is best for the boys. the whole thing has been horrific from start to finish but so long as he [Nathan] is okay and the boys are okay, that's all I can hope for.'

Speaking about how her husband became entangled with a notorious drugs gang, she said: 'I can't understand it. It's against everything I know him to be...'I can only conclude it was a moment of madness on his part. I think once he agreed, he couldn't go back on it.'

But she stressed: 'I'm surmising. He didn't say that to me, I'm only surmising.'

Nathan McDonnell was once regarded as one of Kerry's most prominent businessmen after taking over the garden-centre business started by his family, three generations ago in Tralee. To all appearances, the charming businessman had it all. He and his beautiful blonde wife were spotted regularly entertaining friends and contacts at the five-star Adare Manor Hotel and golf resort owned by multi-millionaire JP McManus.

The glamorous couple were frequently pictured at social events such as the Rose Ball, held during the annual Rose of Tralee festival. He liked to drive luxury vehicles and was a member of the Furze Bush Syndicate, which owns the Cheltenham and Aintree Grand National favourite Stumptown.

His glamorous previous life is a world away from his new reality as an inmate in Portlaoise Prison, where he was brutally attacked last week. While obviously concerned for her husband's security, Jackie said he has assured her he is safe despite the attack, which left him with a broken jaw.

She added that she plans to travel to visit her husband in prison later this week.

She told the MoS: 'I would be concerned about his safety, but he assures me that he is fine, he assures me that he is safe and that's all I can go on at the moment. But Jackie said she has no intention of leaving Ireland, adding: 'I'm definitely going to remain living in the country, it's my home.'

On Friday, McDonnell's father Mike and sister Naomi were in court for his sentencing. His father gave references to the court, outlining the impact that his marital break-up had on his son.

Two of his sisters also gave references detailing the impact that his arrest has had on their three young nephews.

The court heard McDonnell was a 'respected businessman' involved in charitable events and that he had suffered an 'irretrievable loss of his reputation' and brought shame on himself and his family.

He was handed a 12-year jail sentence for the importation of drugs and a six-year sentence for facilitating a criminal organisation to import drugs. The sentences will run concurrently and are backdated to when he went into custody on February 16 last year.

The link between McDonnell and the Sinaloa cartel is understood to 'O'Shea Salazar has ties to drug lord El Chapo' have been forged by Morris O'Shea Salazar, an Irish-Mexican member of the cartel.

O'Shea Salazar spent part of his childhood in Killorglin, Co. Kerry, where he was arrested on several occasions.

But during his 10 years in the country, he also appeared in court on various charges, including firearm possession and public order offences. The dual citizen came to Ireland following the death of his father in a road crash in South America.

The family settled in O'Shea Salazar's father's hometown of Killorglin, where they stayed for nearly a decade. He was jailed for a month but was subsequently freed on a suspended sentence after entering a guilty plea. Nicknamed 'Mexican' while in Ireland, O'Shea Salazar moved back to his native country and is alleged to have become involved in the drug business through familial links.

He has direct ties to the former drug lord Joaquín Guzman, who has escaped prison on two occasions. Guzman, known as the infamous narcotics kingpin 'El Chapo', was finally caught by authorities for a third time in 2016, and remains in a high-security facility in Colorado in the US.

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