Gardaí believe shooting of 17-year-old in Dublin was failed murder attempt

A 17-year-old boy was in a critical but stable condition on Thursday night after he was shot in what gardaí believe was a well-planned attempted murder in Dublin’s south inner city.

The boy cried out for help and shouted “am I going to die” to the people who went to his aid at the scene of the late night ambush on Wednesday.

Local people said the boy was asking where all the blood was coming from and whether he had been shot in the face in the minutes after the attack on Wednesday.

“You could hear him saying ‘help me, help me, am I going to die?’” one woman told The Irish Times. “But he was conscious and he was actually sitting up. He seemed to be conscious and able to talk to people the whole time until the ambulance took him away.”

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Garda sources said it was very unusual for a juvenile to be targeted in an attack that had all the hallmarks of an attempted killing by criminals. They said a major criminal investigation was now underway by gardaí at Kevin St Garda station. The motive for the attack remained unclear.

Blood was visible on the ground at the crime scene on Thursday while a bloodstained Canada Goose jacket was taken away for examination by members of the Garda Technical Bureau.

Gardaí believe the people who shot at the teenager were trying to murder him and that the attack was well planned and was specifically targeted at the boy. The attackers appeared to have information about the victim’s movements and after opening fire on him they ran to a waiting vehicle which was later found burned out about 1km from the crime scene.

The injured teenager, who lives in another part of Dublin 8, less than 1km from where he was shot, was getting into a taxi on Eugene St just before 11pm on Wednesday when his attackers appeared and fired at him. The driver of the taxi and local people raised the alarm, with paramedics arriving to the scene within minutes.

Multiple gunshot wounds

After the teenager was treated at the scene for his multiple gunshot wounds he was taken by ambulance to nearby St James’s Hospital. He has since undergone surgery and while he remained in critical condition on Thursday night, he was stable and hopes were increasing that he would survive.

The scene on Eugene St was sealed off immediately gardaí arrived on Wednesday night and underwent a forensic examination on Thursday. A second scene, at Greenville Ave, Dublin 8, was also sealed off as a Black Hyundai i30 car, registration 07 TS 4838, was burned out there shortly after the shooting and gardaí believe it was the getaway vehicle.

Gardaí are trying to establish where that car was earlier on Wednesday in the days before it was used in the shooting. They have appealed for anyone who has information on the attack or anyone who was in the area at the time, and may have been recording video footage, to come forward.

Wednesday night’s gun attack follows the unrelated shooting dead of Paddy Lyons on the Belclare estate in Ballymun, north Dublin, the week before last. There were concerns among Dublin gardaí that gun crime in the city was becoming more prevalent again after a relatively calm period during the pandemic. Gardaí familiar with Wednesday night’s shooting stressed the inquiry into that attack was still in its early stages and a precise motive had not yet been established.