Night of terror at hands of gang

March 1995

WICKLOW is counting the price of a night of crime at the hands of a vicious gang who raided shops, slashed tyres of Garda patrol cars and private vehicles and threatened violence with iron bars.

The brazen five man gang, thought to have been involved in a smash and raid in which a garda was injured at one of the same shops 12 days earlier, struck the town at between 3 a.m. and 4.30 a.m. on Thursday morning.

The slashed the tyres of four garda patrol cars, six privately owned cars and six civilian owned vehicles which were all parked outside Wicklow Garda Station. The culprits also stole three quantities of cigarettes from Earls Newsagents.

Gardai were forced to give chase in a squad car with a slashed tyre after every other available vehicle was immobilised.

Two officers confronted the gang near to Earls and were threatened with iron bars. The gang then drove to Ashford where they caused extensive damage to Boland’s post office before grabbing £5,000 worth of cigarettes. They drove off in a blue BMW which had been stolen earlier that morning from the Malahide area.