Two men held after raider dies in stabbing

A SECURITY guard and another man are being questioned by gardaí in Dublin after an armed raider was killed, possibly with his own knife, following a botched supermarket robbery.

The incident took place in the normally quiet area of Killester in Dublin’s northside and could re-open the debate on the use of force by members of the public against criminals.

It is understood that two men, armed with at least one knife, entered the SuperValu at about 8.30pm on Wednesday and targeted the newsagents’ counter, demanding money.

After taking an amount of cash the men then attempted to flee the scene but were chased by members of staff.

It is believed the men were cornered in an enclosed area of the carpark and a confrontation followed involving the raiders, members of staff and some members of the public.

One of the raiders sustained stab wounds, while the other man was able to scale a nearby wall and escape across a garden and through a nearby resident’s house before fleeing the area. That house was sealed off by gardaí yesterday.

Gardaí had been alerted to the robbery and on arrival discovered the injured man in the SuperValu carpark.

He was taken by ambulance to Beaumont Hospital but died later on Wednesday night. He was named yesterday as Paul Howe, 23, from Tallaght.

Gardaí arrested a man in his 30s, understood to be a supermarket security guard who is originally from Asia, as part of their investigation into the man’s death.

The security guard was taken to nearby Raheny Garda Station and held under Section 4 of the Criminal Justice Act.

Yesterday morning another man, aged in his 20s and from the northside of Dublin, was arrested and also brought to Raheny Garda station. Locals said the second man was the boyfriend of a shop worker, although gardaí could not confirm this. However, initial reports that the dead man might have been stabbed by his accomplice, were discounted by gardaí investigating the incident.

The supermarket remained closed and the adjacent carpark was sealed off until lunchtime yesterday as Garda crime scene examiners scanned the scene.

When the SuperValu re-opened around 1.00pm the newsagents section remained sealed off.

Gardaí appealed to anyone with any information to come forward and are also expected to look at CCTV footage of the area as they try and uncover the exact sequence of events which led to the man’s death.

Some locals reported seeing a man in a blue tracksuit entering and leaving the Beachcomber Pub close to the SuperValu on a few occasions without buying a drink about four hours before the robbery.

A woman working in a nearby pharmacy said: “You hear about this kind of thing happening in other places but you wouldn’t expect it here.”

The woman of the house through which the other raider is suspected of having escaped, Julie O’Carroll, said she was upstairs with her children at the time and saw nothing untoward. The side door had been left opened by the raider.

Her neighbour, Maurice O’Brien, said he was alerted to the commotion when the Garda helicopter overhead caused windows to vibrate.

Many of the shops and other businesses in the area had closed by the time of the raid. John Joe O’Brien, from Killester, was in the off-licence which forms part of the SuperValu store when he caught “a fleeting glance” of one of the suspected raiders.

“I heard him shouting and there was a little screaming in the supermarket and I just turned tail,” he said. “I told the lady at the counter [of the off-licence] there was a robbery and said to ring the police.”

Staff and management at the supermarket refused to comment yesterday.