Staff manning cash-in-transit vans regularly stop for coffee at the Artane petrol station in Dublin, where a Brinks Allied van carrying up to €2.4 million was hijacked yesterday morning, garda sources have said.
Detectives investigating the robbery are working on the theory that the gang behind the raid had become aware of these stop-offs at the Maxol petrol station on Skelly's Lane and were waiting for a van to arrive yesterday morning.
The van targetted had just begun its daily run having left the Brinks Allied depot in Clonshaugh at around 7.30a.m., about a mile from where the hijacking took place. It then stopped at the Maxol station.
When a crew member alighted intending to buy a coffee, a raider ordered him back into the vehicle and demanded that it be driven to Killester Utd Football Club sports ground off the Howth Road, over a mile away.
The raider held the driver at gunpoint and the vehicle was followed by other gang members in their own white Transit van.
When the Brinks Allied van arrived at the sports ground a second vehicle and another raider were already there. The gang, at least two of whom were armed, then ordered the Brinks Allied workers to unload the van. Around €2.4 million was handed over.
The bags containing the used, untraceable, notes were then loaded into the back of the raiders' van. They left the scene in the Transit and a second blue four-wheel drive sports utility vehicle.
The entire operation took no more than 15 minutes. Because it occurred before the morning rush hour the raiders could have travelled a considerable distance before the Brinks Allied crew had the chance to call gardaí.
Gardaí sealed off the crime scenes yesterday at the Maxol station and the Killester Utd sports ground. Members of the Garda Technical Bureau conducted a full examination of both areas.
The Brinks Allied van was taken for forensic examination. Gardaí also conducted house-to-house inquiries at the Venetian Hall and The Pines apartment complexes, which overlook the Killester Utd sports field.
The Brinks Allied van and the raiders' vehicles entered the sports ground down a narrow lane from the Middle Third housing estate in Killester and gardaí were also conducting inquiries in that area throughout yesterday.
Staff at the Maxol station and the Brinks Allied crew made statements to gardaí. But most businesses in Butterly Business Park where the Maxol station is situated were closed at the time of the early morning raid resulting in few people witnessing the hijacking.
Gardaí have asked anybody with information to contact Coolock Garda station on (01) 6664210.
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