Gardaí fear third murder in week not the last

Gardaí fear that there could be more violence after a third murder in seven days in north Dublin. Detectives are investigating if the spate of gangland killings is part of a murderous campaign by a rival gang or is part of an internal feud.

The man shot dead yesterday afternoon is an Iranian national who is suspected of being a hitman for a major organised crime gang based in the Finglas area. Hamid Sanambar, aged 41, was gunned down outside the house of Sean Little, who himself was found shot dead in north county Dublin late on Tuesday last week.

There were reports yesterday that Little’s body was being waked in the house on Kilbarron Avenue, in the Kilmore area of Coolock, but this could not be confirmed. Gardaí believe three men wearing balaclavas were involved in the shooting and are appealing for sightings of their getaway car, which was found burned out nearby.

Less than 24 hours after Little’s murder, on Wednesday last, Jordan Davis was shot dead in Darndale, adjacent to Kilmore. Little and Davis, both aged 22, were friends and drug dealing associates. They, in turn, were friends and associates of Zack Parker, aged 23, who was shot dead in Swords, north Dublin, last January.

Commenting on the spate of murders, one senior source said:

The temperature has been raised and the fear is it’s only getting going.

A number of garda sources have stressed that no one knows what the motive is behind the attacks and whether or not all, or some, of them, are connected.

“There are as many theories as you like,” said a source. “The fact is no one knows.”

The scene of the shooting on Kilbarron Avenue in Dublin. Pic: Collins.

One senior source said that given who the latest target is, a top line of inquiry would be that a rival gang has launched a murderous campaign to “take out” the Finglas-based outfit.

Several motives are cited to support this theory, one being that the Finglas gang have rivals who might feel emboldened now that the connection it had with the Kinahan cartel is now thought to have been severed.

“The Kinahan cartel has cut them off, so people might be saying we are not afraid of the Finglas mob anymore, they don’t have the backing of the Kinahans,” said one source.

Sources have said there is a perceived vacuum in drug distribution in Dublin given the mass imprisonment of senior members of the cartel, with the exodus abroad of its leaders.

Sources have also said the Finglas mob is being targeted because of links to one side of a violent feud in neighbouring Blanchardstown and even suggestions that the mob is linked to one side of an equally vicious feud in Drogheda.

There are reports that Little and Davis were setting up people locally to be killed. But gardaí have also stressed that the murders could be linked to “internal house cleaning” or an internal feud in the Finglas gang, and the possibility that there may be separate motives to the murders.