Crime gangs luring teens from State care to front stash houses
Vulnerable young people targeted by criminals who f ind them homes they then use as illegal drug dens
CRIMINAL gangs are exploiting vulnerable young people who struggle to find housing after leaving State care, offering them accommodation before turning the properties into illegal drug dens.
Children leave State care once they turn 18, and then must find a property for themselves, usually with the support of Tusla, the State child and family agency.
But due to the housing shortage, many end up in emergency accommodation and in the clutches of criminal organisations, according to community activist and criminologist Trina O’Connor,.
She told the Irish Mail on Sunday: ‘They’ll get their own places through the support of criminal gangs, and then their houses and flats are used as “trap houses”; where drugs are cut or where drugs are sent to. Then they’re in this cycle, and very often they end up the fall guys.’
Ms O’Connor said gangs will seek someone who ‘might be a quiet person or somebody who has never come to the attention of the gardaí. These gangs don’t really want to draw the attention of the guards.’
Ms O’Connor said the strategy ‘is becoming so much more prevalent here because we’ve got a lot of these transnational gangs coming over here now’ who see the housing crisis as ‘an opportunity’ to target vulnerable young people.
‘And then we have the issue of ageing young people out of the care system, so we’re just sending them off as cannon fodder for the gangs.’
Ms O’Connor said Dublin City Council is ‘very hot’ on cases of hostile takeover, as the practice is known.
‘But with privately rented accommodation, it can be very difficult for the council or residence committees or anybody to get rid of the people.’
Children still in care and in dysfunctional homes are also extremely vulnerable to being targeted by gangs, the social worker and presenter of the Real Lives Untold podcast said.
Earlier this year, a study conducted by University College Dublin’s Sexual Exploitation Research Programme (SERP) found evidence that girls as young as 12 in State care – both in Tusla homes and those provided by contractors – are being targeted by gangs for sexual exploitation.
JP O’Sullivan, network and communications manager with MECPATHS, which counters child trafficking, said the grooming of minors for criminal and sexual exploitation is ‘rampant’.
An academic study from almost three years ago estimated there were about 1,000 children being groomed around the country but Mr O’Sullivan said: ‘We would say that it has probably progressed a lot more since that report.’
A new law designed to criminalise gang recruitment of children – nicknamed Fagin’s Law – is progressing through the Dáil.
But Mr O’Sullivan said: ‘My biggest concern is that it [the legislation] relies heavily on the child to give evidence against the person who has groomed them, and a high majority of these children are being groomed by family members – parents or grandparents.
‘What child who has been intimidated into that kind of world will stand up and give evidence against the accused?’
A spokeswoman for Tusla confirmed there were ‘2,988 young persons/adults in receipt of aftercare services’ by the end of June.
She said: ‘Approximately 550-600 young people age out of care annually. However, the number of young people we assisted in finding accommodation is not part of our collated data.
‘Tusla is acutely aware of and remains concerned about the increased risk of exploitation of vulnerable young people in aftercare services and our aftercare teams work to provide the necessary supports in such instances.’
‘Around 550-600 people age out of care annually’