Garda Commissioner Martin Callinan has called for calm after the drive-by shooting of a teenage girl in west Dublin.
He pledged his force was working hard towards bringing 16-year-old Melanie McCarthy’s killers to justice. “I’m very pleased with the progress that’s being made at the moment,” he said.
Gardaí investigating the murder earlier recovered a shotgun believed to be the murder weapon.
The gun was found near where the killers abandoned the getaway vehicle off the Naas Road near Citywest.
Detectives believe Ms McCarthy-McNamara was fatally wounded when a gunman targeting another man in a drive-by shooting botched his aim and shot into the wrong window of the car she was in.
She is believed to be the youngest ever victim of gangland crime.
The teenager was sitting in the rear passenger side of a silver Nissan Almera outside a house in Brookview Way, Tallaght, at 10.35pm on Tuesday when another car carrying a gunman pulled alongside and shots were fired from a shotgun.
Detectives believe a man sitting in the front passenger seat of the Almera was the intended target but the gunman opened fire just before he drew level with the front window. He mistakenly discharged his shots into the rear passenger side of the car, fatally wounding Ms McCarthy-McNamara, before the stolen black Hyundai Santa Fe he was travelling in sped from the scene.
The three men in the car with the victim rushed her to Tallaght General Hospital, where she was pronounced dead at 1am.
Garda sources said some of the men the dead teenager had been mixing with have been involved in drug-related violence and family feuding in recent years in Tallaght. They believe Tuesday night’s attack was part of that violence.
Some of the men Ms McCarthy-McNamara had been associating with are members of the Travelling community with strong links to another family-based drug-dealing gang from Tallaght. This large group has close ties with the McCarthy-Dundon gang in Limerick, where Ms McCarthy-McNamara’s family is originally from.
Arising from these links, gardaí fear Tuesday’s murder may prove the beginning of a new gang feud.
The Irish Traveller Movement said the nature of Melanie’s death had caused shock and distress in the Traveller community in west Tallaght and across Ireland. "We appeal for calm and ask people to offer full cooperation to the gardaí in their pursuit of Melanie’s killers - in what is the appropriate way for justice to be done," a spokeswoman said.
A spokesman for Traveller support group Pavee Point said it "unequivocally condemns this senseless and tragic murder" and called for calm. "We strongly urge anybody with any information on this tragic crime to contact the gardaí … and for those responsible for this heinous crime to come forward."
A team of 40 detectives and uniformed gardaí held a case conference at Tallaght Garda station yesterday, headed by Chief Supt John Manley.
Afterwards he said his team was determined to solve the killing and he believed the killers would be caught. However, he said gardaí needed the public’s help.
“This was a particularly heinous crime involving a young girl of 16 years of age. I would appeal to the community to reflect on this and to take a step back and to provide whatever assistance they can give us to investigate this crime.”
Minister for Justice and Defence Alan Shatter said that the killing was “deplorable”.
“All violent deaths are shocking but the killing of a young person especially so,” he said.