A spate of violent burglaries by Irish gangs in Britain, Australia and the United States has led the Garda Siochána’s organised crime unit and the EU’s law enforcement agency Europol to adopt tactics previously used against global drug cartels.
While the Garda has long co-operated with the Police Service of Northern Ireland (PSNI), waves of pre-planned, lucrative burglaries are now being carried out abroad by Irish gangs.
This includes in the major cities in Britain, but also in the United States and as far away as Australia.
The gangs have moved into some regions in those countries and gathered intelligence on targets before making meticulous plans to carry out their burglaries.
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Of the seven organised burglary gangs who are now the main targets for the Garda Drugs and Organised Crime Bureau, most have their leadership based in Dublin, Kildare and Limerick, though members also live in Carlow, Offaly, Wicklow, Kilkenny and Wexford, and others are dispersed through the country.
Gardaí have also shared intelligence via Europol on one Limerick-based gang with links with burglaries after they had been detected - often conducting construction work scams - in Italy, Belgium, Germany, Portugal, Norway, South Africa and parts of South America, including Colombia and Chile.
The “fly-in-fly-out burglars” have netted cash and valuables worth several hundred thousand euros in a matter of days.
At times, they have stolen items worth more than €200,000 in single burglaries, including jewellery valued at €250,000 from an antiques dealer in the North in 2022.
The Garda Drugs and Organised Crime Bureau is now compiling detailed reports on the gangs, including profiling the men in the groups, their favoured modus operandi, information about their movements and intelligence about their future plans. These reports have been sent to Europol for sharing with international law enforcement.
The move mirrors the tactics being used to combat Irish drugs gangs who have relocated some of their personnel, or even their full leadership, to countries like Spain and the Netherlands, and also to Dubai.
“When the heat comes on them here, they’ll go across the Border. So we’re constantly in touch with the PSNI, and the police in Britain,” said one source familiar with the current workings of seven organised burglary gangs that are now key targets for the Garda.
“We’ve seen some of these people cleaning out parts of London. Then they’ll be up in Scotland and then back here again. And when they target a particular area, all the homework has been done in advance.”
Garda sources added that the gangs worked mainly in English-speaking countries, though they have carried out some crimes in continental Europe.
Gardaí are concerned, not only at the scale of some of the burglaries, but also the violence to which the Irish gangs will resort, especially if they are trying to evade being caught, including during pursuits, of it they find homeowners in properties during their burglaries.
The Criminal Assets Bureau (Cab) has already unearthed evidence of the scale of some of the international operations by the gangs. For example, in one ongoing Cab case, a gang based in Australia sent back $1 million Australian dollars (€550,000) to Ireland via cash transfers over a prolonged period.
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In another case in Australia, three Irish suspects were arrested last year suspected of stealing €612,000 in burglaries, while other Irish suspects in Melbourne are accused of stealing €300,000 in cash, jewellery and designer goods during a spate of burglaries.
In the US, members of Irish gangs have been identified, and in some cases deported. However, in some investigations those gang members were running scams in the US, including charging home owners exorbitant fees for bogus repairs to their properties.
While those were not burglary crimes, they were very lucrative, and some of those involved are also suspected of playing a role in organised Irish burglary gangs. The membership the Irish organised burglary gangs is normally fixed and tight knit, but it can be fluid at times depending on what support the groups need to carry out crimes and hide or launder assets.
However, the Irish gangs have been most active in parts of Britain, including London, Manchester and Liverpool. They have often relocated there for long periods, with one source saying a gang had “cleaned out” houses in a suburb of London before reappearing in the Republic again.
