THERE is more to the murderous attacks which have so panicked rural Ireland than merely a perplexing outbreak of criminality. These things are not as: inexplicable as a shower of meteorites passing through the atmosphere. There is cause, there is effect. The causes are not so easy to identify - but we all know the effects.
We are learning in a rather rude fashion that the failure of citizens to fear the State and its agencies or to respect the dignity of their fellow citizens can have rather unpleasant consequences, especially when the broader community in Ireland which kept a sharp eye on one another, which would look to the straying individual, which would mind the bewildered and guard the hapless, seems to be no more.
On Our Own
What it looks like is this: we are on our own. The old woman who answers her door after nightfall or who wakes up, her heart thumping like a donkey kicking the stable door, at the sound of a roof joist cracking in the middle of the night, knows this most of all. And she knows the penalty for not being alert is degradation or death.
This is simply unacceptable. This is the effect. But what is the cause? How is it that gangs of people apparently think - nothing of going out on organised raids on old people, with a bit of murder or buggery in mind? And what is the deterrent? In the absence of us all being equipped with teams of American wrestlers to mind us through the night, I suppose we must all depend on the courts to mete out condign punishment on wrong doers.
No doubt we may all sleep safely in our beds following the recent case in Trim where four women, from the same family and from the same address in Belgard Road, were recently before the court.
These women enjoying a certain economy of name - two of them are called Mary Connors and two of them are called Anne Connors - were arrested by Enfield gardai last June. They were charged with the burglaries of two pensioners' homes, one in Longford, the other in Westmeath. The victims two women aged 71 and 82, were, we read, terrified by the robberies, in which a child had participated.
I am unable to work out the relationships between the splendid Connors women. One Mary is 30 the other 35. One Anne 64, the other 21. Possibly the two Marys are sisters; no doubt that would save a fortune in monogrammed underwear and so on, but surely the confusion it would cause in the home would hardly be worth the savings. Maybe one Anne - my guess would be the oldest one - is the mother of the lot of them. On the other hand, maybe Mary (35) is the mother of Anne (21), and Mary (30) is the daughter of Anne (64).
Criminal Business
At all events they are an ornament to Irish womenfolk. Not merely did they scare the living daylights out of two old ladies - I wonder how these poor creatures are now sleeping at night - but they also deployed a child about their criminal business.
Their punishment? One year imprisonment each. This is good news. No doubt they will be out of jail in time for the tourist season, by which time we might all hope and trust that that fine fellow, John Francis McAllister will be back in circulation. Mr McAllister is the splendid man who was involved in the attack on two Germans in the Phoenix Park, leaving one dead and one with permanent eye injuries. He was sentenced to seven years' imprisonment, but was allowed out for Christmas after just two Yules behind bars.
But surprise surprise, this veteran of 66 previous convictions did not return after Christmas. He then persuaded two gardai sent to arrest him that he was lawfully at large, so they left him, and by the time these super sleuths finally returned to make their arrest, he had - again, surprise surprise - vanished.
Can they be related, I wonder, to Alison Connors who was travelling in a car with Patrick O'Connor and Martin Ryan in Newcastle Road, Galway, two weeks ago? This trio of citizens was stopped by two clearly excellent gardai. The driver gave a false name, their car had false number plates; and inside it were a hatchet, a knife with a six inch blade, a baton and two pairs of gloves.
Names Unsullied
The driver, Mr O'Connor, has a burglary conviction. He was convicted add sentenced to two years in jail and banned from driving for ten years. His two companions were allowed to leave the court, their glorious names unsullied, the presiding judge ruling that the case - against them had not been proven.
Judge John Garavan, said of these people: "It goes without saying that that awful arsenal in that car was clearly intended for unlawful purposes. It is reasonable to assume that the people whose cases I have dismissed were working with this defendant. Whoever their intended victims were, we'll never know."
I do not know Judge Garavan; but am I alone in hearing the anguished note of a frustrated man who knows the law, and is, quite rightly, sticking to it, but finds the experience deeply frustrating? Clearly the law is at fault here; the right to silence is an absurdity and a insult to the law abiding community when the carrying of potentially lethal arsenals does not legally oblige defendants to give an explanation of what they are about. No doubt my friend Nora Owen agrees with me.
Punishment alone does not stop crime. This we know. But it does set a tenor through society about what is unacceptable; it is a measure of how seriously we defend the well being of the innocent. When we do not, neither do criminals. The harvest is upon us.