Former Court of Criminal Appeal judge Declan Budd left an estate worth €3.58 million when he died in August 2025, according to papers published by the Probate Office this week.
Budd, of Blackrock, Co Dublin, came from a prominent legal family. His father, Frederic Gardner Orford Budd, was a judge of the Supreme Court.
A foundation scholar of Trinity College Dublin, Budd was called to the Bar in 1968, appointed senior counsel in 1981, and to the High Court as a judge in 1991.
He was appointed to the Court of Criminal Appeal in 2008 before retiring in 2011.
He was president of the Law Reform Commission from 2000 to 2005. During his time at the commission he was credited with overseeing vital modernisations of Irish statute law.
He was also an early advocate for allowing family law cases to be heard in public to increase institutional transparency.
In a landmark legal contribution, his rulings were instrumental in preventing the privatisation of the Blasket Islands off the coast of Co Kerry, protecting them as elements of national heritage.
He was a dedicated member and former club captain of Three Rock Rovers Hockey Club. He also spent many years volunteering locally as a member of the Dún Laoghaire association of An Taisce.
[ Founder of Peploe’s in Dublin leaves more than €2.8m in willOpens in new window ]
In other grants of probate, Rainsford Hendy, former mayor of Kildare and Fine Gael stalwart for almost two decades, left an estate valued at €2.1 million.
Hendy was first elected to local government in 1991 and served for nearly two decades representing the Athy electoral area until his political retirement in 2009.
Hendy also ran a business making garden sheds. He was a keen fundraiser for the Irish Cancer Society and a member of the Diocesan Synod for the Church of Ireland.
Following his death in September 2024 aged 73, Hendy was the subject of many tributes from high-profile political leaders, including Leo Varadkar. The former taoiseach said the two had met when they were both councillors and kept in touch over the years. The Hendy family could be proud of his contribution to Co Kildare, Varadkar said.
Racehorse breeder Duncan McGregor of Newtown Lodge Stud in Kildare left an estate valued at €1.49 million when he died aged 84, in February.
Originally from Falkirk, Scotland, McGregor relocated to Kildare with his wife, Lynn, when he was in his 40s and dedicated the rest of his life to equine breeding and racing.
One of his first broodmares was Gradille, whose bloodline went on to produce notable winners including Soldier Of Fortune, Sholokhov, Subjectivist, and Intense Focus.
He successfully bred and raced several winners of his own including Dashing Colours, winner of the Listed Knockaire Stakes, and Shesasmartlady, dam of winner Captain Marvelous.
McGregor also had notable success with Danega which he bought for €16,000 in 2022. Her offspring, Marhaba Ya Sanafi, went on to win the Poule d’Essai des Poulains at Longchamp, which McGregor described as his greatest day in racing.
Corporate lawyer and chairman of Enable Ireland Stephen Haughey left an estate valued at €2.04 million when he died in April 2026.
Haughey, of Skibbereen and formerly of Belfast and Wicklow, also served as a senior figure at KPMG.
He used his legal and strategic expertise to serve as the national chairman of Enable Ireland, the country’s largest non-HSE organisation supporting people with disabilities.
Under his guidance, Enable Ireland campaigned aggressively to improve diagnostic wait lists and direct resources to family support networks.
- The sums cited in this article include all assets, typically including a family home, land and investments.