Another theft

Rew

I wonder is this the same group as the dealer in Tipp and the one up the North? Very worrying either way.

http://www.breakingnews.ie/ireland/mhsnojojidid/rss2/

Woman and child held hostage by Tyrone raiders Print

21/01/2009 - 13:25:31

A woman and her child were held hostage by raiders in Co. Tyrone last night while her partner was forced to hand over a number of legally-held firearms to the gang.

Two masked raiders, one of them armed, forced their way into a house in the Castlestrange area of Strabane.

They ordered the man to drive across the border and hand over the weapons in a church car park in Corcullion, Co. Donegal.

They subsequently released his partner and child, who are said to be shaken, but unhurt

Rew

A few more details: http://www.rte.ie/news/2009/0121/strabane.html

Sparks

That's getting distinctly worrying.

Darr

Indeed it is ..

For anyone looking to increase security , dont know if any good but just saw this
http://www.aldi.ie/ie/html/offers/2867_8122.htm

delop

Might some of ye guys in the area be better off handing your devices into a dealership until the Gardai find these fuppers, it seems they are finding out who has dangerous weapons in private hands somehow....

this is the worst case scenario and its coming true, a scenario that some members swore black and blue that did not happen and if it did it would be rare...

Rew

No Gardai over the border

We haven't seen anything like this before sounds like a gang out to tool up (disident republican as suggested by the media Gardai). This guy had 10+ firearms sounds like a dealer which would make 3 dealers targeted so far.

freddieot

Yet again when any person is subjected to a violent robbery there are those that are keen to make some political point, usually at the expense of the victims. I for one feel sympathy for the family involved and contempt for those responsible.

As this refers to the theft of firearms in Northern Ireland by what looks like criminals from here, it could instead be argued that our precautions are generally so good that they now have to cross the border to steal firearms -

One could argue case proven, as they obvioulsy consider it an easier and better risk in NI than here. However, I won't say that, as, it would be as infantile and broad a statement as saying we should all hand up our firearms and wait for the Guards to catch the baddies.

Rew

If they are disident Republicans are they not more likely to be from the North?

In this case the robbery began in the north and ended in the south. Sounds like the bad days of the IRA all over trying to complicate any investigation by hopping back and forth over the border. Potentaily the same group that tried to murder a couple of PSNI officers last year. Co-Op between north and south has probably never been higher then it is these days so hopefully we will see these guys picked up soon. The sad reality of this type of robbery is that its effective aainst almost any target.

delop

freddieot wrote: »

infantile

I guess thats directed at me, I for one was very concerned at the pattern I see developing, and was concerned for your safety as i suspected that there was something odd going on, I thought my post would show concern, but I have either a terrible command of the english language or you take every comment on your form that does not blindly support you cause as an attack on your rights.

I was not being political, but I can tell you this I will get political from this moment on, Ill be sending an email to my local TD to express my concerns about private gun ownership in this country...

Rew

Written text loses alot in the translation, this is out of the ordinary and comes at a time when shooters feel like they are getting the blame for everything.

freddieot

I guess thats directed at me, I for one was very concerned at the pattern I see developing, and was concerned for your safety as i suspected that there was something odd going on, I thought my post would show concern, but I have either a terrible command of the english language or you take every comment on your form that does not blindly support you cause as an attack on your rights.

I was not being political, but I can tell you this I will get political from this moment on, Ill be sending an email to my local TD to express my concerns about private gun ownership in this country...

What pattern - The most recent firearms theft in the State was one from a Garda, an official issued firearm. Perhaps based on your logic, they should not take them home with them in future until a safe and monitored alarm is installed in all their house by the Department of Justice.

Concerned If you were genuinely concerned for my safety then I apologise for my earlier comment. However, it did not seem that way. I based my interpretation of your comment on some of your previous posts and while they are for the most part relatively fair, I do not however detect a concern for the welfare of gun owners.

Lastly, you take exception to one (my) comment, as I did to yours, so now you are going to rush off bleating to your TD about the evils of Gun Ownership. What was the word I used - O yes - infantile.

IRLConor

delop wrote: »

Might some of ye guys in the area be better off handing your devices into a dealership until the Gardai find these fuppers, it seems they are finding out who has dangerous weapons in private hands somehow..

Even if we did all agree to hand in our firearms there wouldn't be enough secure storage with dealers around the country. Not just that, but it would make the dealers even more juicy targets.

Oh and "dangerous weapons"? All firearms are potentially lethal. The day people class centrefire handguns as being somehow more lethal than other firearms is the day that some plonker shoots his mate with a .22 on the grounds that "it's only a .22".

Sparks

Actually, handing them in would be a disaster - garda stations don't have secure storage for firearms, so they'd just store them with the local dealers. So our handing in our firearms would actually make the situation worse by making the dealers more attractive targets!

freddieot

+ Sparks.

They might also throw them out with the rubbish as happened on at least one occasion after one was handed in during the amnesty if memory serves me rightly.

(and that one WAS used to commit a crime )

Sparks

In fairness freddieot, that pistol wasn't deliberately thrown out with the trash...

freddieot

Apologies again, I did not mean to imply it was deliberate. I'm sure it was an honest mistake easily made -
these things happen.
Why just last week I had a wine bottle (empty I might add) in the Brown Recyle Bin when the other half reminded me that it was only for grass not glass.

Rew

freddieot wrote: »

(and that one WAS used to commit a crime )

No it wasn't, it was just found during an unrelated search. I have a link to the news story somewhere.

Anyway we don't have to react so strongly he was only putting forward a suggestion given whats been going on.

TheNog

Sparks wrote: »

Actually, handing them in would be a disaster - garda stations don't have secure storage for firearms, so they'd just store them with the local dealers.

WTF???

What station are you talking about?

AFAIK all district hq have armories

IRLConor

TheNog wrote: »

WTF???

What station are you talking about?

AFAIK all district hq have armories

Evidently not big enough. I'll PM with specifics.

Sikamick

The finger pointing at firearms holders, firearms dealers or Garda that have had there firearms stolen will not solve the problem, all of these people are victims of crime.

No matter what level of security the Firearms Dealer in Tip had, having a gun put to his head and is family threatened would lead him to opening his safe and handing over its contents, as it would with anyone else.

The solution is in the law, sever sentencing for possession of illegal firearms, when a sixteen year old can get bail within a week after murdering a man down in East Wall, this makes an ass of the Law/Judiciary. A rapist released on bail rapes and murders a girl, releasing this person is a crime in itself.

A person caught with a large amount of drugs gets 10 years and rightly so, and on the other hand a person caught in possession of three unlicensed shotguns gets a 6 months suspended sentence and a 500 Euro fine, by the way they weren't belong to his Grannie he smuggled them into the country.

Crazy is all I can say.

Stiffer sentencing that's the only way to solve the crime problem, a survey in the UK asked a number of young people if there was a five year sentence for possession of a knife would they still carry them, the majority said no they wouldn't.


Sikamick

Trojan911

delop wrote: »

Might some of ye guys in the area be better off handing your devices into a dealership until the Gardai find these fuppers

No thanks. That would entail a 40 mile round trip for me before I go down to Kerry to shoot.

And even if Gardai had the space & they were handed into Garda HQ's, which would still be a 40 mile round trip, do you honestly think some won't get damaged, scratched or mislaid etc.

bunny shooter

delop wrote: »

Might some of ye guys in the area be better off handing your devices into a dealership...

Apparently it's the dealers that are being targeted? ......................... hardly a good idea to put even more firearms into dealers and make them better targets :rolleyes:

Maybe if the licensing system was faster dealers might not have as many firearms held on their premises?

TheNog

As has been pointed out so far it has been mainly dealers that have been targeted and you may noticed these thefts are occuring at night. Im sure one of the reasons for them occuring at night is because the criminals have better control over the situation i.e. the owner nor his family have no time to push any panic alarm button in their house or at the business premises because they are being constantly watched and threatened. This gives them a distinct advantage.

The only way I can see to at least take way some of that advantage is for the dealer's premises alarm to be of a time lock nature. Say the business is shut from 5.30pm in the evening and reopens at 8.30am the next morning. Well if the alarm is monitored in such a way that any deactivation between 5.30pm and 8.30am results in a Garda response (would be a high priority call) to the dealers house and premises at the same time. I think this could deter criminals from doing over the dealers.

The only problem I see is it could force the criminals to carry out these thefts during business hours which may put other customers and staff at risk but it would also be a higher risk to the criminals themselves.

What ye think?

Sparks

I think you think RFDs live in the city. Most don't, including all those cases (both recent and historic) where the RFD has been robbed. I also think you're not fully considering the situation - in these cases the dealer had a gun to his head and those of his family. I also think you think the Gardai would respond in minutes to such a callout - even if they were sitting in the car with the engine running when the call came in, and broke every speed limit on the way, they would still have a response time long enough to let the criminals escape simply because of the distance between them and the scene.

The solution here is not to penalise the RFDs with more rules and regulations for having the audacity to be the victims of armed robbery; it is to give the order (and the funding) for the Gardai to hunt down the criminals responsible.

And if nothing else shows that there is no "them and us" situation between shooters and the general public, it's these cases. We are the general public and we are the victims of gun crime. Punishing us is not the solution.

TheNog

Sparks wrote: »

I think you think RFDs live in the city. Most don't, including all those cases (both recent and historic) where the RFD has been robbed. I also think you're not fully considering the situation - in these cases the dealer had a gun to his head and those of his family. I also think you think the Gardai would respond in minutes to such a callout - even if they were sitting in the car with the engine running when the call came in, and broke every speed limit on the way, they would still have a response time long enough to let the criminals escape simply because of the distance between them and the scene.

The solution here is not to penalise the RFDs with more rules and regulations for having the audacity to be the victims of armed robbery; it is to give the order (and the funding) for the Gardai to hunt down the criminals responsible.

And if nothing else shows that there is no "them and us" situation between shooters and the general public, it's these cases. We are the general public and we are the victims of gun crime. Punishing us is not the solution.

Sparks, is that directed at me? Just not sure is all

Sparks

It is Nog, you asked what we thought.

TheNog

Sparks wrote: »

I think you think RFDs live in the city. Most don't, including all those cases (both recent and historic) where the RFD has been robbed. I also think you're not fully considering the situation - in these cases the dealer had a gun to his head and those of his family. I also think you think the Gardai would respond in minutes to such a callout - even if they were sitting in the car with the engine running when the call came in, and broke every speed limit on the way, they would still have a response time long enough to let the criminals escape simply because of the distance between them and the scene.

The solution here is not to penalise the RFDs with more rules and regulations for having the audacity to be the victims of armed robbery; it is to give the order (and the funding) for the Gardai to hunt down the criminals responsible.

And if nothing else shows that there is no "them and us" situation between shooters and the general public, it's these cases. We are the general public and we are the victims of gun crime. Punishing us is not the solution.

Ah grand, Didnt want to post a long winding post without good reason.

I realise dealers do live outside of cities and making a fairly educated guess that all or nearly dealers that have been robbed live in isolated areas far from prying eyes.

My idea is not to persecute the dealers in any way with more regulations. In fact the only change needed would be for the alarm companies in how the dealers premises alarm is monitored differently. I see this as cost effective way of deterring this problem without adding any more cost or regulation to the dealers.

Tbh I cant see how this idea would punish firearms dealers or holders of firearms. Although I have little experience in firearms I am against the banning of firearms. The government approach to this problem is ill concieved and a knee jerk reaction which is not going to solve the problem at all.

Sparks

TheNog wrote: »

My idea is not to persecute the dealers in any way with more regulations. In fact the only change needed would be for the alarm companies in how the dealers premises alarm is monitored differently.

And the timelocks. Which, for the sort of secure storage most RFDs would have, isn't going to be terribly cheap. We're not talking about a small safe here, in most cases you're talking about actual strongrooms.

Not to mention that if someone has a shotgun to your child's head, you don't want to be trying to explain that the door's on a timelock - you want to be giving them everything they ask for, and not risking them getting more frustrated and agitated.

ancienthunter

I think there is nothing better than an alarm system and a dog combined with common sence about locking doors. The whole idea is of course to warn you in advance. ONE WOULD HAVE BAD SITUTATIONAL AWARENESS if you thought a monitored alarm would offer sufficent protection IT ONLY BUYS YOU TIME.

One would also have bad situational awareness if you thought you'd be safer without a gun

So bearing that in mind just reading all the stuff about handing in yours guns is wrong. We are not in the wrong and anyone coming into your home with volience and aggression should be treated with the same if you could pull it off safely and have the upper hand and that brings us back to fore-warning.

I think if this inspired the powers that be to ban types of guns, that some crimimals only THINK are more desirable, because of the very act of breaking and entering a persons home and holding people hostage is un consitutional and wrong. If we get a sniff of anything like this we should jump on the legal bangwagon straight away.

Irish people were never walkovers and HOPEFULLY some of us will not be.

lets just hope the crimimals only have the weak hand guns. I'll stick with my 12g

Rew

Sparks wrote: »

And the timelocks. Which, for the sort of secure storage most RFDs would have, isn't going to be terribly cheap. We're not talking about a small safe here, in most cases you're talking about actual strongrooms.

He means a time locked alarm not a physical lock. It certainly wouldn't do any harm as they all generally already have a decent alarm system so there shouldn't be a cost. It may cut their options down but I doublt it would stop them. If you believe whats reported in the media (big if) this is one gang who are tooling up to setup a terrorist group. Narrowing their options probably wont stop them they need to be cut and the kneees and put away. Easier said then done I know.

bunny shooter

Sparks wrote: »

It is Nog, you asked what we thought.

Should that not be "I" ?