Sinead O'Connor 'handed crack on wedding night and Barry Herridge was frightened'
Last updated at 11:14 PM on 29th December 2011
Sinead O'Connor has spoken about being handed Class A drugs after taking her new drug-counsellor husband on a marijuana hunt on their wedding night.
The Irish singer says her fourth marriage was in trouble from the start and the wild search on the mean streets of Las Vegas led to their eventual split 16 days later.
The 45-year-old insists she still loves Barry Herridge, 38, but says she ended their relationship on Christmas Eve because of the pain he was in.
Stressed: Sinead O'Connor, pictured outside her home this week, has spoken about her post-wedding search for drugs
The couple met online four months ago after Barry responded to a plea by unlucky-in-love Sinead asking for potential suitors to come forward.
They married on December 8 in a quickie wedding at the famous Little White Chapel in the Nevada state.
Sinead told The Sun that she took him on a search for cannabis afterwards.
'We ended up in a cab in some place that was quite dangerous.
'I wasn't scared — but he's a drugs counsellor. What was I thinking?
'Then I was handed a load of crack. Barry was very frightened — that kind of messed everything up a bit really.'
Radiant: Sinead glowed with happiness as she married drugs counsellor Barry Herridge in Las Vegas on December 8
The purchase or possession of cannabis is an offence in Nevada, subject to a fine of up to $ 600 for a first offence.
But far more serious might be the repercussions for the Glenageary-born singer's music career.
For the U.S. authorities routinely refuse travel and work visas to those who have committed 'crimes of moral turpitude'.
These crimes include 'a violation (or conspiracy or attempt to violate) any law or regulations of a State, the United States or a foreign country relating to a controlled substance'.
In 1992, Miss O'Connor appeared to advocate marijuana smoking and in a 1999 Irish Times interview, she admitted to smoking 'weed', saying: 'I do not take drugs – I smoke a little weed now and again, which I told the social workers and they laughed.
'I do not take drink or any other drugs. Everybody knows that.'
Over before it started: Sinead was snapped at the door of her home in Bray in a bath towel, after admitting her marriage begun to unravel within three hours of the ceremony
The mother-of-four said the marriage was also sabotaged early on by the 'interference of certain people'.
'It felt like I was living in a coffin. It was going to be a coffin for both of us and I saw him crushed.
'The whole reason I ended it was out of respect and love for the man.'
The Nothing Compares 2 U singer says she will never marry again and may not even date anyone.
Sinead this week emerged from her home looking tired, stressed and grey-haired.
Gone was the pretty pink frock from her wedding - and instead she came to the door in nothing but a towel before hurriedly changing into a T-shirt and jeans.
'I love him very much': The singer made the announcement on her website, revealing the couple only lived together for 7 days
The singer announced on Boxing Day that her 'dream' fourth marriage had ended after just 16 days.
She said on her website that the marriage was in trouble just three hours after the Las Vegas ceremony, when people close to her husband tried to 'kybosh' it.
Sinéad posted a statement on her website stating that she had decided to end the marriage after just seven days of domesticity.
She wrote: 'There was intense pressure placed upon him by certain people in his life, not to be involved with me. These were people who had never met me but had formed opinions of me based on what they read about "Sinéad O'Connor" in the media, etc'.
But she admitted that her husband had also been very upset by a 'wild ride' they took to try and buy marijuana on their wedding night, as she doesn't drink alcohol.
Legally binding: A spokesperson for the Little White Wedding Chapel in Las Vegas confirmed that the couple would have to take legal action to dissolve the wedding
But despite its apparent spontaneity, the couple will now have to wait four years to legally end their brief union.
The Little White Wedding chapel confirmed to the Mail that the marriage certificate the couple signed was a legally binding contract.
'Basically, once the couple have consummated the marriage it is not easy to have it annulled.'
The wedding to Mr Herridge was to be the fairy-tale ending to the singer's search for love, which she launched last summer across Twitter and on The Late Late Show, even attending the annual matchmaking festival in Lisdoonvarna, Co. Clare.
Then the singer shocked the nation by writing a series of candid blogs on her website, detailing what she was looking for in a man.
Another love: O'Connor married musician Steve Cooney last year
Exes: Sinead's first husband was to music producer John Reynolds
She wrote in September that she was in 'desperate need of a very sweet, sex-starved man,' but specified that he 'must be no younger than 44, must not be named Brian or Nigel, must be blind enough to think I'm gorgeous, has to be employed and he has to like his mother.'
Inundated with thousands of replies, Miss O'Connor selected just one man to go on a date with – her future husband.
Split: She had a child with Frank Bonadio
'Barry sent me this wonderful email, which just took my heart away. It had to be him,' said the mother of four.
Originally from Donaghmede, north Dublin, but now living in nearby Raheny, Mr Herridge revealed the contents of the email that kickstarted the relationship.
'I was getting off a train at Connolly Station one morning when I saw this woman acting strangely on the platform. At first I didn't know what she was doing and then I realised she was playing hopscotch. It wasn't Sinéad but a businesswoman in a suit and in her 30s, just having a bit of fun.'
He added: 'I wondered why more women that age weren't doing the same thing. And it struck me that this was exactly what Sinéad was doing with her search for love, having fun, and I told Sinéad about this woman in my first email.'
The story struck a chord with Miss O'Connor, who invited the paediatric psychotherapist out on a date last August. A coffee shop on Dublin's South William Street was the setting for their first face-to-face meeting and it was love at first sight.
On December 7, the couple announced their intention to marry, using the Today FM Breakfast Show to get the happy news out to the nation.
The singer kept the happy news quiet when she appeared on the Ian Dempsey programme the previous day, telling him she had no gossip to share. But Barry rang the show on Wednesday morning to let the cat out of the bag
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