WOMAN WILL NOT BE GIVEN HOUSE IN DELGANY
Decision made after protests
A BRAY MOTHER will not be housed at Farrankelly Close in Delgany following angry scenes at the estate last Friday morning.
Residents opposed attempts by Wicklow County Council staff to move Helena O’Brien into number 54. However, in an email to a resident yesterday (Tuesday), a council official said that the council is now ‘not proceeding with this allocation’. Council officials arrived with Mrs O’Brien and a juvenile family member on Friday morning but were unable to open the door of the house and subsequently left the area.
Witnesses reported verbal confrontations outside the house between a number of residents and the proposed tenant.
A BRAY mother will not be housed at Farrankelly Close in Delgany following angry scenes at the estate last Friday morning.
Residents opposed attempts by Wicklow County Council staff to move Helena O’Brien into number 54.
However, in an email to a resident yesterday (Tuesday), a council official said that the council is now ‘not proceeding with this allocation’.
Council officials arrived with Mrs O’Brien and a juvenile family member on Friday morning but were unable to open the door of the house and subsequently left the area.
Witnesses reported verbal confrontations outside the house between a number of residents and the proposed tenant, Mrs O’Brien.
Some of the residents of Farrankelly Close and surrounding areas had been maintaining a vigil outside the property since then.
A security firm was engaged and had been stationed at the house since last Friday. However, a window was broken there in the early hours of Tuesday morning.
‘ This is a vulnerable community,’ said one resident of the estate. ‘We all had to be garda vetted.’
She said that existing residents had concerns due to criminal convictions linked to some members of the family, particularly the serious assault of an elderly woman by Mrs O’Brien’s son, Jamie.
Jamie O’Brien (24) is currently serving an eight-year sentence after he and Michael Cash broke into the home of 89-year-old Eva Sutton in Bray and assaulted her in September 2015.
Residents had prepared a petition objecting to the proposed tenancy which they were going to present to the county council and they had also intended to seek legal advice.
A resident of nearby Eden Wood said that he had been involved in the ‘stand-off ’.
He said that a number of public representatives attended Farrankelly Close on Friday morning, including Deputy John Brady, Cllr Nicola Lawless, Cllr Tom Fortune and Cllr Derek Mitchell.
‘ The door was sticking and couldn’t be opened,’ he said. ‘ They went off when they couldn’t get in. The residents didn’t prevent them entering.’
He said that the house has been vacant since March and that furniture was moved in prior to Friday.
In a statement on Monday, Wicklow County Council said that it does not comment on individual cases or allocations due to data protection regulations.
‘Security has been placed on the property to prevent further damage to the property by persons unknown,’ the statement said.
As regards the concerns of neighbours, the statement said that these had been ‘noted’.
However, yesterday, a council official contacted a Farrankelly resident stating that Mrs O’Brien would not be moving into number 54.
‘A serious incident occurred which prevented Wicklow County Council completing this allocation,’ said the official.
‘Damage was also caused to council-owned property.
‘Accordingly, due to safety concerns and pending the outcome of a garda investigation into the criminal damage which occurred, (the council) has reviewed the matter and is not proceeding with this allocation,’ the official said.
Mrs O’Brien was formerly a resident of Hazelwood in Bray, but her house was fire-bombed in June 2016 after she and her family had vacated the property. She has been housed by the council in a number of locations since that time, including another address in Delgany.