Mother and daughters trapped in house blaze may have been targeted in feud

A FAMILY trapped in a house fire may have been the victims of an escalating neighbourhood feud, it emerged yesterday.

Police said they rescued four women from the blaze at Trasnagh Drive, Scrabo, Co Down.

As detectives confirmed they were treating the fire as suspicious, friends told of previous attacks on the home where Rosalind Stewart, 48, and her daughters have lived for 10 years.

Three weeks ago windows in the property were smashed, allegedly by a gang of men carrying hammers.

“It seems a dispute between local families has degenerated into one side getting hooligans involved,” one source said.

“This family can’t call on any men to support them, but the other side have been able to get some friends.”

Thick smoke hampered the women’s attempts to escape the flames which took hold early yesterday.

But police officers alerted to the emergency were able to guide them from the house. They were later treated for smoke inhalation.

Police do not suspect a sectarian motive.

The fire, with possible links to a festering row, shocked the community. George Ennis, a DUP councillor, said: “If this is down to a dispute it’s worrying that people can use it to literally create a raging inferno.

“Nothing can justify setting fire to someone’s house. There are ways and means of sorting out neighbourhood problems and this is not one of them.

“It seems life is so cheap that people can resort to violent means to settle trivial problems.”

Mrs Stewart claimed the fire was an attempt to kill her and her daughters.

With threats apparently made by people claiming to represent paramilitaries, she claimed: “They know there is gas in the house, I would say it was an attempt to murder us.”