00:00 Good morning everybody, Garda Commissioner Harrison just wanted to do a quick statement
00:08 and take a few questions.
00:10 Good morning everyone.
00:13 Yesterday's events were just terrible between the awful attack which happened at 1.30 in
00:18 the afternoon and then the subsequent disorder, riot and looting in our city centre.
00:27 It's just disgraceful scenes from start to finish.
00:31 Overall we have 34 arrests, 32 of which will be appearing before the courts this morning.
00:39 We have 13 shops which have been significantly damaged or have been subject to looting.
00:49 We have 11 Garda vehicles either destroyed through arson or very extensively damaged
00:55 and 3 public transport buses destroyed and a Lewis train destroyed and also the extensive
01:03 damage as I've said.
01:05 So huge destruction from a riotous mob who were in effect responding at our crime scene
01:16 to try and break into that crime scene and disrupt the crime scene at about half five,
01:22 quarter to six and then from there on the violence escalated.
01:27 Order was restored at about between half eight and nine o'clock as we deployed more resources.
01:37 And Garda SĂochána responded to this entirely and in an extraordinary fashion.
01:44 Members from across the country, not just here in DMR, responded, returned to duty.
01:49 Public order units from all over Ireland responded here to Dublin.
01:53 More and more resources were arriving throughout the evening but we could not have anticipated
01:58 that in response to a terrible crime, the stabbing of school children and their teacher,
02:04 that this would be the response.
02:07 In effect, those filled with hate and the hate directed towards members of Garda SĂochána,
02:13 that they would attempt to storm through our cordon and disrupt the crime scene and then
02:17 engage in violence, looting and disorder and including very significant criminal damage.
02:23 Nobody could have anticipated that when these events started at 1.30, these awful events.
02:32 And obviously we were concentrated upon the investigation.
02:35 We couldn't have anticipated that this would be the reaction.
02:40 Well the build up of tensions as you describe on social media, we were monitoring those
02:45 and we were constantly then adding to our resources that were available in DMR North
02:50 Central.
02:51 That was an ongoing part of the operation and we did respond but it has to be said that
02:56 the crowds, the crowds of those in the first place protesting, filled with hate, directed
03:01 towards members of Garda SĂochána, were then supplemented with those who were only
03:06 intent upon crime, disorder and the looting of premises.
03:10 As you can see this morning, particularly sports type shops were specifically targeted.
03:15 Now Garda SĂochána reacted quickly to that and were able to clamp down on that looting
03:22 but we responded as the events unfolded.
03:27 But I don't think at 1.30 as the original events unfolded or indeed later in the mid
03:32 afternoon we could have anticipated such disorder.
03:36 Well this is not a failure of personnel.
03:39 All members of Garda SĂochána responded to this.
03:43 Everyone stood up to the plate in terms of their response.
03:45 I now have to look to the tactics that we have for public order.
03:49 We have not seen public order situations like this before.
03:52 This may be behaviour which is apparent in other countries but I think that we've seen
03:57 an element of radicalisation.
04:00 We have seen a group of people who take literally a thimble full of facts and make a bathtub
04:05 of assumptions, hateful assumptions and then conduct themselves in a way which is riotous
04:10 and disruptive to our society.
04:14 We then have to respond to that in terms of our tactics and training.
04:18 But there's no failure here.
04:21 This is regrettably how protests have moved on and now we have to graduate and have a
04:27 proportionate response to that.
04:30 Well with respect what happened last night was an entirely different scale to the events
04:35 outside the Dáil and the Dáil has now received a new police response to the public order
04:41 situations.
04:42 We have adapted our tactics there but we're going to have to have a fundamental review
04:46 of our public order tactics given the amount of violence directed towards citizens, members
04:51 of Garda SĂochána but also the community.
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