A violent feud between Traveller families has led to violence in Tralee and fears that it could damage Kerry’s world-famous festivals
A FEUD which is seeing deep division in the Traveller community in Tralee has already led to extraordinary scenes in the town, but gardaí and Traveller leaders warn that it now threatens to affect the world-famous August festivals which attract thousands to the county.
The origins of the feud are unclear. Garda sources maintain it is now about a power struggle and a number of incidents are tied to it, including an alleged assault on a UK motorway.
Fifteen people are now before the courts arising out of the latest episodes in a feud alleged to be between leading members of the Quilligan and the principal Coffey clans with other minor families also being drawn in.
Armed gardaí have been called in to patrol housing estates on the Mitchels or eastern edge of Tralee around what is known locally as “the bull ring” area of the town – an allusion to an old mart area; the regular weekly district court sitting at Tralee’s imposing empire courthouse is now being barred to all but concerned parties, and a weapons search takes place at the main entrance, much to the chagrin of solicitors and newly fledged barristers.
Last Wednesday, Det Sgt John Brennan, a senior investigator into the feud, told the District Court that the situation, which first erupted in May, was “as volatile as ever”, the row had grown to dangerous proportions and peace efforts involving several agencies had failed. Gardaí, he said, were “extremely worried” that serious harm would be caused.
In some of the most extraordinary scenes ever witnessed at the town’s courthouse, up to 150 Travellers sat out on the steps, overseen by gardaí. In Bailys corner, a well-known pub across from the courthouse, customers openly talked about the bad name the town was getting, and all because of “a handful” of Traveller families.
The settled community is fast losing patience – but other Traveller families are also deeply affected, community leaders openly acknowledge. In recent days, several Traveller families left their local authority houses in the Mitchels areas to move into mobile homes on a green area alongside Kerry County Council’s brand new offices in Castleisland on the Killarney road, ignoring pleas from the mayor of Kerry, Cllr Bobby O’Connell, to return to their homes.
An array of weapons including slash hooks and iron bars as well as a shotgun have been seized by gardaí. Curfews have been imposed in the courts. However, in one of the more serious outbreaks, on Sunday last a row raged for nine hours, spilling over onto the grounds of nearby Kerry General Hospital where gardaí arrested a number of people. Vans, cars and house windows were smashed during the trouble, which involved as many as 50 people, with more than 20 gardaí at the scene.
Help was summoned from the armed regional response unit. This week, five people were charged in relation to incidents arising out of Sunday’s incident. Prosecuting Garda Inspector Martin McCarthy alleged that one side was made up of Quilligan, O’Neill and Fitzgerald “factions”.
Garda sources allege that the other side involves Coffeys now backed up by the McCarthys, both of them old Kerry Traveller families, based in Castleisland and Tralee.
It was the second time the regional response unit has been called onto the streets of the town – in May it was deployed after gardaí received information that large quantities of weapons, including hatchets and Stanley knives, had been purchased in the town.
Following that, in late June on a Monday afternoon, Tralee’s largest graveyard, Rath cemetery, witnessed dramatic scenes during the funeral of a Traveller man, with a brawl spilling onto the N22 roadway. At the subsequent court hearing scuffles broke out on the steps of the court between the two sides.
Tralee gardaí now fear further violence as relatives of both sides gather for the annual Traveller get-together of Puck Fair in Killorglin in early August and the Rose of Tralee Festival later in the month which will see Traveller families return for the event.
Local Tralee Sinn Féin councillor Cathal Foley, who has family connections in the Mitchels area, has been warning for some months that matters were about to get out of hand after he was approached by locals wanting to move out altogether. Several agencies, including the Church and HSE social workers, have been seeking to resolve the dispute.
However, “even George Mitchell wouldn’t have a hope here,” Cllr Foley says. “It is up to the Traveller leaders. The bottom line is a number of families will have to move out of Tralee because if these families remain it is not going to be resolved.”
Regeneration of the Mitchels area has stopped at St Martin’s Park where houses are boarded up and neglected. However, the broader Mitchels area was an old area of Tralee; it is undergoing multi-million euro investment and the old stock of Tralee were extremely fond of it, Cllr Foley says.
“I have been walking up and down there for years and I have never had any trouble. The majority of people who lived in the Mitchels are not troublemakers. Traveller families themselves are coming to the Sinn Féin office over the past weeks asking to be moved out of the area. Non-Traveller families want to get out. If one or two of the troublemakers moved it would resolve the whole thing.” People were being intimidated and the matter was brewing on and off for some time, he says.
Ben Archibald, information coordinator of Pavee Point, says mediation officers from the main national organisations, including the Irish Traveller Movement, have been involved in trying to end the conflict. “We engaged at an early stage in conflict resolution training,” he says. However, some of those involved in the dispute felt they could not continue with the training.
Owen Mc Carthy, co-ordinator with the Kerry Travellers Development Project, says the organisation is “very concerned” at the impact of the present conflict between some Traveller families in the county. “From our outreach work it is very clear that some members of the community, including children, are not able to go about their daily lives with any degree of routine or safety,” he says. “Kerry Travellers Development Project totally deplores all violence and strongly urges those involved to stop immediately. Such behaviour impacts on the other Traveller families in the county who are living peacefully.”