Security guard shooting sparks safety concerns

Cormac O’Keeffe

The comments were made after a security guard was shot at close range as he pleaded with his assailant not to open fire.

Union officials said it was the first such shooting in recent times and marked a worrying escalation in armed robberies on security vans.

SIPTU’s Security Branch yesterday demanded:

An immediate increase in the number of armed garda escorts for cash deliveries.

Greater financial contribution from banks to enable gardaí increase the escorts.

More CCTV’s at cash delivery points, ATM's and on cash transit vehicles.

Making CCTV cameras on cash transit vehicles a condition for licensing security companies.

A review of vulnerable cash delivery points.

An early meeting with Justice Minister Michael McDowell.

“Last year, we repeatedly warned that eventually, if these armed robberies continued, someone would be shot. That has happened now,” SIPTU’s Security Branch secretary Kevin McMahon said.

“We are concerned that the next time there could be serious injury, that loss of limb could be involved or someone killed.”

The robbery occurred when a Securicor van made a delivery to the Ulster Bank branch in Clane, Co Kildare, at 9.30am, before the bank opened.

The security guard was walking across the pavement into the bank, carrying a ‘smoke box’ containing cash, when he was confronted by two masked men, at least one of them armed with a shotgun.

Eyewitness Madeline O’Hare said the security man ran around the van, trying to escape.

She told RTÉ radio she saw the security guard going down on the ground.

“He was, to me, like pleading ‘please don’t.’ He had his hand up in the air. He was just on the ground and went back.”

When she and others went over to the guard he was going in and out of consciousness and that there was “blood everywhere”.

The man was taken to Naas General Hospital and onto St James’s Hospital in Dublin where his condition was last night described as “satisfactory”.

Supt Tom Neville of Naas Garda Station said the investigation was at its initial stages.

“We are piecing together what happened and carrying out house-to-house inquiries in the vicinity and the scene is being technically examined,” he said.