Five held as gardaí recover 45,000 lager cans

FIVE men were being held by gardaí last night after €75,000 worth of lager cans were discovered in a Cork warehouse just four miles from where they were stolen.

The haul of 45,000 cans had been taken from a 40-ft container at a dockyard by thieves who took three hours to transfer them to another lorry.

The cans, which had been imported from The Netherlands, were stored in 24-can slabs for distribution to off-licences in the city and surrounding areas ahead of the festive season. They were stolen from Tivoli Docks in Cork city.

The gang’s activity was discovered at the dockyard on Wednesday morning and detectives were called in.

Security footage taken from the entrance to the yard showed a 24-foot white DAF rigid truck with a distinctive wind deflector above the cabin which was higher than the trailer.

“We believe the men involved loaded the drink onto the truck by hand after breaking into the container,” said a garda spokesperson. A team of forensic experts then examined the emptied container and the surrounding area.

The dockyard is used by Heineken and other companies to store products before distributing them around the country. Gardaí said at the time the robbery had been highly professional. It had also been thought the gang had moved the drink up country.

However, yesterday afternoon gardaí carried out a surveillance operation at a warehouse in the Glanmire area which is just four miles from Tivoli Docks.

Shortly before 3pm uniformed and plain-clothed gardaí pounced on the warehouse in Sallybrook where they recovered the cans which had a retail value of €75,000. They also arrested five men at the scene.

A senior garda spokesman said one of the men was in his 40s while the rest were in their 20s. Two of the men were from Cork city but he refused to say from where the other three came.

The men were being detained under Section 4 of the Criminal Justice Act 1984. All five were being held in two garda stations in Cork city. Three of the men were being questioned in Mayfield garda station while the other two were being held in Watercourse Road garda station.

“Once the investigation is completed the drink will be returned to the owners,” the garda spokesman said.

There have been a number of robberies from Tivoli Docks during the past year. Last August a gang stole a large boat propeller worth €10,000 from the same area.