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Updated 8.20pm
GARDAÍ ARE APPEALING for people who regularly use Bray Boxing Club to speak with them if they noticed any suspicious behaviour at the gym in recent days or weeks.
The appeal follows a shooting at the Co Wicklow gym this morning that left one man dead and two others seriously injured.
The incident at Bray Boxing Club occurred at 6.55am. A gunman walked into the gym and fired a number of shots. He was wearing dark clothing and had his face covered.
One man aged 50 was killed in the shooting. Gardaí originally stated he was aged 30, but they issued a correction this afternoon. He has been named as local man Bobby Messett.
The father of three from Kilmacanogue in north Wicklow was very highly thought of and was known in his community for his love of exercise. Gardaí believe he was a completely innocent victim who was in the wrong place at the wrong time.
Gardai wish to trace the movements of the silver coloured Volkswagen Caddy van with Northern Irish registration used in the shooting. It is believed that this van travelled from Bray through Shankill and the Cornelscourt area before being abandoned on Pigeon House Road at approximately 8.05am where a male was seen leaving the van and cycling away.
Gardai appealed:
Messett was pronounced dead at the scene. Speaking to reporters this afternoon, Superintendent Patrick Ward said the man was attending a fitness session at the gym, as he regularly did.
They were just about to start their session when somebody came in – a gunman – he was carrying a firearm. We believe it was a handgun and he started opening fire just as they were about to start the session and three people received gunshot wounds.
Pete Taylor, father and former trainer of Irish boxing champion Katie Taylor, was injured in the incident and is in serious condition. The 57-year-old sustained injuries to his arm and chest.
Another man, aged 35, was also injured and has been taken to St Vincent’s Hospital. It is understood he suffered gunshot wounds to the leg.
“We have no known motive at the moment for the crime, we don’t yet know why the crime was carried out,” Superintendent Ward told reporters.
Following examination of CCTV in the area, gardaí are now appealing for information about a silver coloured Volkswagen Caddy with Northern Irish plates, believed to have been used by the shooter.
The van is believed to have travelled along Seapoint Road towards Bray Town Centre. There are also possibly sightings on the Dublin Road, but these have not yet been confirmed. Anyone with dashcam footage of the area from that time of the morning is asked to share it with detectives.
Gardaí believe there was just one shooter, but they are trying to establish whether there was someone else in the van with him.
Superintendent Ward said there were up to 20 people in the gym this morning when the shooting occurred and investigators are asking witnesses to speak to them about what they saw. They are also asking people who regularly use the gym and who may have noticed something suspicious recently to get in contact.
Gardaí are conducting door-to-door enquiries and are collecting CCTV footage.
Olympic, European and World champion boxer Katie Taylor previously trained at Bray Boxing Club, but no longer has any involvement with the gym. It is understood she is currently training in the United States. The club was set up by her father.
Speaking to TheJournal.ie, local Sinn Féin TD John Brady, said he was “devastated” by today’s news.
He said many local people train in the gym and the victims are “good decent people”.
Brady said it was too early to speculate about a motive, but said he is thinking of the families and friends of the victims.
“I’m absolutely shocked, anyone could have been in there. It seems like it’s totally indiscriminate.”
Local woman Elizabeth Tynnan, who works in her family’s factory next to the club, said she saw people being taken away in ambulances this morning when she arrived.
“It’s crazy, I could have been in the middle of it.”
She said Pete Taylor runs a bootcamp class at 7am and many of the local young men attend.
The woman said the club is “fantastic” and that it had done “wonders” for the town.
Speaking to RTÉ’s Morning Ireland, Minister for Justice Charlie Flanagan described the incident as “shocking”. He said gardaí are “actively engaged” at the scene and are appealing for people with any information to contact them.
The minister said it is important that “the appropriate level of evidence is coming out” at an early stage in this investigation.
Gardaí are at the scene and the garda helicopter is scanning the area. They are appealing for witnesses to contact Bray Garda Station on 01 6665300.
- With reporting by Christina Finn at the scene in Bray, Co Wicklow and Garreth MacNamee
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This young farmer/food producer is completely right to suggest that his sector is being made a scapegoat for the sins of the combustion industry.
As combustion induced global heating gathers pace at a frightening speed, maybe Irish farmers should take a leaf out of the oil cartel’s handbook, and cut production in order to increase prices abroad for top quality food.
We need to use our own land to produce our own energy, and finally break free from the stranglehold of fossil fuel addiction.
To simply live, we need to live simply.
@Ciaran Sherry: and if every country takes a similar approach to food production then what happens? Reduced food supply doesn’t just result in higher per unit prices, it also results in mass starvation. How many people should we be looking to sacrifice in our pursuit of this simple life?
@Ciaran Sherry: I suspect that if Irish farmers cut production, farmers elsewhere would just be thankful for being gifted markets.
@Ciaran Sherry: They would be swallowed by the global marketplace. The fact is food production and human consumption are not sustainable. Diets need to be supplemented and the process needs to part move into a lab, yes yes, the jobs the people, I’m not talking about tomorrow but it’s coming and is unavoidable.
@Ciaran Sherry: a lot of people think that things will be the same buy what u want eat what you want farmers followe the policy of government in 2007 this included the greens cheap food high production they all screamed knowing this was not good for biodiversity now the very same people are saying the opposite so farmers will now cut production eu climate policy has no payments planned what so ever for this despite grace suleiman and other greens saying we will be compensated farmers should tell them to go where the sun doesn’t shine
Whoops – hospitals over the last 25 years.
But apparently we’re meant to believe we can change the planet’s climate
The climate doomsters conveniently forget the climate of Earth has changed regularly & mankind has always managed to adapt.
AND we now have technology our ancestors could only have dreamed of.
We should encourage our hard working farmers to create as much food as possible
Simples
@Gerry Kelly: ‘mankind has always managed to adapt’: What price would you be willing to pay for ‘adaptation’? As more and more parts of the world turn to uninhabitable desert, would you be happy to see the population of Ireland increase to, say, 30 million through migration that people are forced to undertake in order to survive?
Oddly, it seems to me that the climate crisis denialists and those most opposed to (inward) migration are always the same people.
@Gerry Kelly: 1) Mankind has already changed the planet’s climate. Hence the mess we have created.
2) Mankind has only existed on this planet for a couple of hundred thousand years. A blink of the eye with regards to the species that have come and gone since life arose here. Through most of that time we have barely hung on. But the last 6 thousand years or so have been a climate sweet spot for humans, allowing us to expand across almost the entire planet, and increase our population to 8 billion.
During the last 200 years or so we have polluted our atmosphere with greenhouse gases that have and will increase global temperatures.
We are now approaching the the upper limit of that climate sweet spot.
@Gerry Kelly: Nope, people who know about anthropogenic climate change also know about natural climate change, it’s only those who are minimally informed who think otherwise. Mankind have not gad to adapt through a mass extinction event yet which is what we’re staring down the barrel at at the moment.
World population 1950 – 2bn
2050 – projected to hit 10 BN
Our island nation has a population of 5 million & we haven’t been able to build enough houses schools or hosp
@Gerry Kelly: World population 2000 years ago was probably in the region of 150 million.
Hence the attack on farmers to devalue land for the landgrab which will “offset” emissions.
Don’t fall for this, guys.
Lovely steak
The issue is that farming lobbyists and representative organisations appear to use exactly the same tactics as the fossil fuel industry: block, deny and try to preserve the status quo.
If farming representative organisations come with proposals to reduce subsidies for fossil fuels and fossil fuel companies, to reinvest these in promoting sustainable farming (i.e. switching from livestock farming to tillage and land regeneration), I reckon there may be quite a few who’d go along with this. The only ones I see coming up with these type of solutions are those that farmers hate: environmentally-minded policy makers.
The planet’s climate is changing
It has in changed in Ireland 7 times since the last Ice Age melted away
Unless I’ve got something wrong – we appear to have survived those changes & my hunch is we’ll survive this one also
@Gerry Kelly: Your hunch outweighs science. You win.
It might very well be true. If it is you were put there, not by the Greens but by Mr. Badman and his cronies in the Department. If farmers free themselves of these malign influences they might find that people appreciate them and the work they do
We have been told that Ireland has high per capita Greenhouse gas emissions.
This article claims that a reason why Ireland’s farming related CO2 emissions are such a high proportion of our total is that we do not have the heavy industry of other countries.
Something is awry.
@ItWasLikeThatWhenIGotHere:
Per various CO2 emissions per Capita lists for 2021/2022:
Ireland averages around 7 t
Palau in Oceania around 178 t
@ItWasLikeThatWhenIGotHere: yes but when you add up our total emissions it is nothing will have no effect on the climate biodiversity here is another question though
@Athena: According to worldinfometers, in 2022 Ireland’s per capita CO2 emissions was 8.29 tonne, with Palau at 2.34 tonne.
But that is not the point I was raising.
We are told our per capita emissions are high, compared to the average, or even the just among our peers.
Yet this article states that we do not have the heavy industry of other countries, that heavy industry to makes up so much of their emissions. The article claims that because the absence of emissions from heavy industry, our emissions from agriculture is relatively high, i.e. appears high only because of this absence.
Something does not add up.
If that claim is correct, then how on Earth are our per capita emissions so high?
Or is that claim misleading?
Why are so many of the articles “comment closed”.
@T M Byrne: in case SF/IRA would bring publisher to court
One third of all food produced worldwide is wasted, and that waste contributes the same GHG emissions per year to the global total as the total emissions of the European Union. Now by my reckoning if that food waste was tackled and eliminated, it would reduce the global GHG emissions by the same amount as I mentioned earlier.
That would be a major step in the right direction and it would effectively reduce global agricultural emissions by one third. Because less waste means less need for production.
Seems unfair to farmers who happily produce other than dairy/livestock, this article doesn’t give them a mention?
… any adults in the room?
Daft to start killing Irish cows which feed 44 million people, to reduce emissions
… while we have NO TAX (World Wide) on jet fuel or tanker fuel ….
… to fly us off on City Breaks and Tourist trails
and ship all those unnecessary goods around the world.
No VAT, No Excise Duty, No National Oil Reserve Levy” … nothing.
…. “Far from Right!”
… any adults in the room?
@Neuville-Kepler62F: technical point – I don’t know about you but my cows are dead when I eat them. Bit hysterical?
Just to make it clear – I am absolutely NOT a climate change denier. It is abundantly clear the p
Who in earth would ever listen to a farmer lol
@Murray peter: Everyone with a bit of intelligence would.
Tell us about your knowledge of farming?
How many days a week do you work?
Farmers work a seven day week, year in year out.
have your say