Thieves target massgoers

April 1994

DEMANDS ARE being made for an increased Garda presence outside Easter Masses, in response to a series of recent attacks by thieves on local church-goers.

A 65-year-old woman became the latest in a growing list of local victims of bag snatching youths when she lost almost £100 worth of property as she returned from worship at the Church of the Most Holy Redeemer at Main Street, last Saturday night.

The theft occurred at the junction of Castle Street and Lower Dargle Road as the pensioner was on her way home at 8.30 p.m., and followed just a week after a woman lost her bag at Quinsboro Road, after Mass.

In another similar incident last week a woman had her handbag snatched as she left the urban council offices at St. Cronan’s.

The Parish Priest at The Holy Redeemer Church Fr. John O’Connell condemned the attacks on local parishioners and said that such incidents were both frightening and upsetting to their victims.

He stated however that the Holy Redeemer still experienced a relatively low level of crime, and that he did not believe that church-goers were being targeted specifically by the bag snatchers.

‘Bag snatching appears to be going on all around the place, and in many instances the offences don’t even seem to be reported to the Gardai,’ he said.