Garda cannot deter every gun attack, says Frances Fitzgerald

An Garda Síochána is determined to tackle resurgent gun murders, and any dissident republican threat to the 1916 centenary celebrations will be met head on, the Garda Commissioner and Minister for Justice have said.

Commissioner Nóirín O'Sullivan and Minister Frances Fitzgerald were speaking at a graduation ceremony for 99 gardaí at the Garda College, Templemore, Co Tipperary, yesterday.

While more gardaí were being recruited and saturation policing had been put in place in parts of Dublin considered gun-feud flashpoints, domestic and international experience had shown this could not deter every gun attack, Ms Fitzgerald said.

“What you have to do is take every possible action and give the resources that are necessary to have the greatest degree of public safety that can be provided,” she said.

‘Intent on revenge’

Some armed gangs in the Republic represented a serious challenge for the Garda, Ms Fitzgerald said. “These are people who, as we have seen, are intent on revenge and we’ve seen the appalling atrocities that they’ve committed,” she said. She was referring to three gun murders in the past six weeks, two of them related to a major gang feud. However, Ms Fitzgerald insisted “these people are not outside the law”.

Ms O’Sullivan said while any number of murders was unacceptable, the recent fatal shootings needed to be seen in the context of longer-term trends. There were 22 gangland murders in 2009 compared to three last year, she said.“Unfortunately this year we have seen a resurgence in that activity. But the reality is that no matter how many gardaí we have, we cannot have gardaí everywhere all the time,” she said.

Extreme violence

Criminal gangs were determined in their intent to inflict extreme violence on each other but the force would tackle them and disrupt their activities, she said.

The Garda had reorganised its units tackling organised crime and there had been more than 100 key arrests last year by the new Drugs and Organised Crime Bureau, which had also seized illicit drugs valued at more than €24 million, Ms O’Sullivan said.

She welcomed the fact that 600 recruits were taken into the Garda College in the past 18 months and that 300 would begin training in the period to June. However, she was seeking further clarification from the Garda Inspectorate on its recent suggestion that 1,000 Garda members could be freed up from administrative posts for frontline duties.

Ms O’Sullivan also noted that since 2009 there had been 41 reports produced on foot of inquiries into and studies of the Garda force, involving more than 700 recommendations.

Her comments will be seen as a challenge to the Garda Inspectorate and the level of scrutiny to which the force is being subjected. Asked if there were concerns of dissident attacks in the Republic to mark the centenary of the 1916 Rising in the coming weeks, especially considering the bomb attack against a prison officer in Belfast last week, Ms Fitzgerald said there was no cause for complacency.

“Obviously there is always an ongoing security situation and that’s very much within the operational remit of the Garda commissioner to manage that. But we have no particular information at present in relation to any specific threat.”

Ms O’Sullivan echoed those views, saying a small cohort of paramilitary figures were always closely monitored. Speaking ahead of the funeral of dissident republican Vincent Ryan (25) on Tuesday, Ms O’Sullivan said she had been in contact with the dead man’s family.

She said the family had called for no revenge for his murder and insisted his would not be a “military” funeral.

There had been fears of a public order flashpoint if there was the same show of paramilitary strength seen at his brother Alan Ryan’s funeral in September 2012 which had a colour guard dressed in paramilitary combat clothing. Shots were also fired over his coffin.