Riots terror in Rathnew

November 1995

A Halloween banger sparked the worst of two nights of street riots and attacks on Gardai over a turbulent bank holiday weekend in Rathnew.

A mob of around 100 people, mainly youths, clashed with Gardai for almost an hour in the first of the incidents early on Monday morning, resulting in one injured officer, three damaged squad cars and four arrests. The riot broke out shortly before midnight as Gardai from outside the Wicklow area, who were operating a checkpoint in the village, detained a man on suspicion of drunken driving.

But contrary to the popular story which emerged afterwards, the trouble actually flared up after the arrest of a second man unrelated to the first incident, after he fired a banger at local officers when they arrived to take the first man to Wicklow Garda Station. A relation of the second man intervened physically to try and prevent the arrest and the trouble escalated into a full blown riot as friends and bystanders joined in.

During the melee, bricks and stones were hurled at the officers and Garda reinforcements were called in from Arklow and Gorey. Officers in a total of ten patrol cars spent almost an hour battling to get the situation under control. At one stage a prisoner was pulled from a car before being taken back into custody. One officer was badly bruised after being kicked on the leg, while a concrete black was thrown through the window of one of the Garda cars.

Trouble flared up again in Rathnew less than 24 hours later after a row which broke out in a local pub spilled out onto the streets.