Widow in hospital for shock after shooting

A TERRIFIED Limerick widow was still in hospital last night after her house came under fire in the city’s latest gun attack.

The house in St Mary’s Park was targeted early on Sunday, despite the deployment of the heavily armed Garda Emergency Response Unit (ERU) last week to shooting blackspots such as St Mary’s Park.

The woman, who is in her 60s, is being treated at the city’s Mid-Western Regional Hospital for shock.

A spokesman for the HSE said her condition is stable.

Gardaí confirmed that shots were fired through the front door of her house early on Sunday.

The attack happened at St Colmcille Street, a short distance from St Ita’s Street where six houses were hit by machine-gun fire a week ago.

The woman was brought to hospital by ambulance in a very distressed state.

Members of the ERU were ordered into Limerick last week by Garda Commissioner Fachtna Murphy following the machine-gun incident.

Justice Minister Brian Lenihan described the situation in Limerick regarding gun attacks as a “tinderbox”.

Some of the houses hit by up to 20 high-velocity bullets are owned by people associated with the Keane- Collopy gang, who operate out of the Island Field — the popular name locally for St Mary’s Park.

The estate had up to last week been seen as a safe enclave for the Keane-Collopy gang, as there is only one way in and one way out.

The rival McCarthy- Dundon gang mounted an audacious attack using a Mercedes car stolen in Dublin, which was fitted out with a roof sign to look like a taxi.

Local councillor John Gilligan said that while the deployment of the ERU was welcome, this latest incident proved that their temporary presence would not deal with the current level of crime in the area.

Mr Gilligan said: “The people responsible obviously knew the ERU have been sent to the city, yet went ahead and carried out a gun attack on this unfortunate widow.

“I am very concerned that somebody would carry out a shooting knowing that the ERU are here.

Having the ERU in the city for a limited period of time will not deal with the problem. We need a dedicated armed force of gardaí with their own superintendent tasked with the job of taking these people off the streets.”

Cllr Gilligan said that after the Veronica Guerin murder the Criminal Assets Bureau was set up to take the money off criminal gangs.

He said: “Why not now set up an armed unit here in Limerick to take them off the streets and to do it a new way.

“We can’t expect unarmed community gardaí to tackle this situation as they would be putting their lives on the line.”