Former businessman Breifne O'Brien has been sentenced to seven years in jail after pleading guilty to 14 sample counts of deception and theft involving around €8.5m between 2003 and 2008.
He dishonestly induced five people to advance millions of euro to him to invest in bogus property deals in Manchester, Paris and Hamburg.
O'Brien also got them to invest money in a bogus linen shipping insurance scheme.
His crimes were described as a classic pyramid scheme.
A previous court hearing was told he used money from friends and acquaintances for investment in property and businesses in Ireland and abroad for himself, including an apartment in Barbados, and to buy a car for his wife.
Today the court was told only €420,000 has been recovered and none of it has been repaid to the injured parties in this case.
The court heard that O'Brien had signed all documents he had been asked to in an effort to make sure that his creditors were repaid.
He had also met a representative of those who had lost money and given him information on property investments.
The court heard a "highly speculative" list of potential assets that could be realised had been drawn up.
But prosecuting lawyers said that even if every single euro was recovered it would have to be divided between a much larger group of people who have lost money than the five people named in these criminal charges.
In a previous court hearing in July, the court heard O'Brien was destitute and lived on €188 a week.
When "investors" wanted their money back, O'Brien would convince someone else to give him money for a bogus investment.
Towards the end of 2008, the court heard, it all came to an end.
O'Brien wrote cheques that bounced and claimed his taxi business had been burgled.
Detective Sergeant Martin Griffin said he had tried to buy himself some time.
He was eventually confronted by two brothers who lost more than €3m and attended a meeting in a Dublin solicitor's office with some of his creditors, where he admitted everything.
Their solicitor Brian Quigley said O'Brien expressed sorrow and remorse at this meeting but also said it was "easy to pull the suckers in while the economy was booming".
O'Brien denies saying that.
The court heard O'Brien's crimes have had a devastating financial effect on the injured parties.
One of them, Pat Doyle, who lost €500,000, said he was not able to give his children the kind of education he had planned to give them, although O'Brien had been able to give such an education to his children.
His lawyer told the court O'Brien had lost his home, his marriage had ended and he had lost meaningful contact with his three children.
He had lost contact with his elderly father who had guaranteed some of his transactions, unaware his son had no funds to meet them.
He said the accoutrements to the lavish lifestyle he had once had were well gone.
O'Brien was now living an entirely different life to the life he had in 2008. He had been portrayed in the media as the poster boy for the worst excesses of the Celtic Tiger.
The court was told O'Brien always believed the people who had given him money would get their money back.
Defence counsel Patrick McGrath said O'Brien showed genuine remorse and was doing everything he could to make good the losses to the injured parties to the extent he could.
One of the victims, Louis Dowley, knew O'Brien for 25 years, as his wife had been in Trinity College with him.
Aggravating factors taken into account
Judge Patricia Ryan said she took into account the aggravating factors in the case which were the serious nature of the offence, the amounts involved, that they took place over a period of time, the number of transactions and the breach of trust.
The mitigating factors in the case were his plea of guilty, his expression of remorse, no previous convictions, the effect this would have on his ability to earn a living in future, the adverse publicity, his previous good character, the fact that he volunteered information in 2008, his efforts to make good the losses and his willingness to sign any documents when asked.
Ms Justice Ryan said she had to mark the seriousness of the offence and it merited a custodial sentence.
She imposed a three-and-a-half-year sentence on the deception charges and seven years for theft. Both sentences are to be served concurrently.
O'Brien showed little reaction when sentence was handed down. He was immediately led away by prison officers to begin his sentence.
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