Two men remain in custody following the shooting dead of a convicted criminal in Dublin yesterday.
Two males, one in his 20s and a juvenile, were arrested by gardaí last night.
Stephen Byrne (32) from Mariners Port was shot dead at approximately 4.40pm yesterday at the junction of St Laurence Place East and Sheriff Street in Dublin’s north inner city.
Gardaí said the victim had been standing with a number of other people from the area prior to the shooting.
During a media briefing today, Supt Frank Clerkin, who is leading the investigation, said the group was approached by a man on a bicycle from the direction of Laurence’s Place East.
The man dismounted and walked over to the group holding a gun. Several people fled the scene and the gunman shot Mr Byrne before cycling back along St Laurence’s Place East in the direction of Seville Place.
No one else was injured in the shooting.
Gardaí have appealed to motorists or pedestrians on Seville Place at the time who may have seen the gunman cycling along the road to contact them.
“We don’t have a great description of him but we feel he was young because he seemed to be fairly agile in his movements, he was wearing a grey hoodie and a balaclava, and was on a black pedal cycle,” Supt Clerkin said. “It was unlikely that he was wearing this balaclava as he was cycling to and from the crime."
Gardaí said the gunman made his way onto Seville Place in the direction of, but not as far as, the Five Lamps. “We are looking for anybody who may have seen him turning left or right after he got onto Seville Place to contact us.”
An incident room has been established at Store Street Garda station and the public asked to ring the 24-hour lines on 01-666 8000 or 01-666 8089 with any information.
Minister for Justice Dermot Ahern said in Dublin today the killing was “an awful worry” and he urged members of the public to assist the gardaí in their investigation. “All we can do is plead with the general public to come forward and give whatever information they have,” he said.
Mr Ahern said Ireland had the toughest laws in western Europe when it came to gangland crime and he singled out the recently-introduced legislation allowing the use of covert surveillance in court. He said there was no other legislation the Government could introduce, other than internment. “I don’t think we are going to go down that road," he said.
The killing has been linked to a gangland feud that has now claimed five lives and resulted in sustained violence for nearly eight years. It is the 17th gun murder in the State this year.
Gardaí had warned Byrne his life was in danger, and he often wore a bullet-proof vest. He was the chief suspect for a gangland killing over three years ago linked to the Sheriff Street feud and had a string of convictions. He was known to gardaí as a joyrider when he was aged just 10 years.
In 1997, when aged 18 and addicted to crack cocaine, he and his brother Jason (then aged 21) were jailed for 12 years for a series of armed robberies.
They threatened to shoot gardaí while robbing a newsagents. In another incident, the brothers held a knife to the genital area of a jeweller while a gun was placed between his eyes and they robbed him of jewellery worth £65,000 and £5,000 in cash.
In 2008, Stephen Byrne offered a payment of €20,000 in compensation to two women he had robbed at knifepoint.
His solicitor told the court the money was a compensation sum which Byrne had received from the Residential Institutions Redress Board for “horrific” abuse as a child.
Byrne was a member of an organised crime gang based in Sheriff Street that has been feuding with a rival faction since 2003.
Both factions were once all part of the same gang, but it split when the gang’s leader and now convicted rapist Christy Griffin (40), originally from Canon Lillis Avenue, Dublin, was first accused of rape.
In December 2006 two men from the north inner city – Gerard Batt Byrne (25) and Stephen Ledden (28) – were shot dead in separate attacks as part of the feud.
Mr Ledden was shot in a case of mistaken identity. The gunman was looking for the man who had shot Gerard Batt Byrne two weeks earlier, but shot Mr Ledden instead after mistaking him for the other man.
Byrne, who was a cousin of Gerard Batt Byrne, was the chief suspect for Mr Ledden’s killing.
Another cousin, Aiden Byrne (32), was a convicted rapist who was shot dead in February as part of the Sheriff Street feud.
Stephen Byrne’s brother David (26) died last July after being hit over the head with a sock filled with batteries while imprisoned in Mountjoy.
His body was then desecrated by people who broke into the funeral home and wrote the word “Rats” across his forehead in an incident believed to be linked to the Sheriff Street feud.