He was also described as a drug dealer, and had been linked to a plot to import heroin into Northern Ireland, along with an accomplice, Frankie Mulholland, shot dead by loyalists in 2002.
[2][3] Between late 1999 and early 2000, he became involved with a dispute against local members of the Real Irish Republican Army (RIRA), including its commander.
According to an article in the Irish Independent:[3] The gang, all wearing balaclavas, confronted Matthew outside his mother's house in JF Kennedy Park on the outskirts of Castlewellan.
He was enormously strong, and in a prolonged one-against-seven contest he overcame the gang, finally pulling the balaclava off one man – the local IRA "officer commanding" and exposing him to people who had come out of their houses.
Unmasking the IRA man almost certainly saved his life at this point as the "commander" could not afford to be seen giving the order to have Matthew shot in front of witnesses.
In Castlewellan, just as in Belfast Short Strand where Robert McCartney was murdered for standing up to the IRA for his friend, no one is allowed to resist the will of the IRA.Burns was afterwards the subject of a booby-trap bomb placed on his car at the house of the mother of his girlfriend.