Gardaí uncover 'extortion gang'

Gardaí in Dublin believe they have uncovered an organised extortion racket being run by a prominent member of the Irish National Liberation Army (INLA) after armed officers raided a house in the west of the city on Friday evening.

Nine people were arrested when a man was found stripped naked, bound and beaten in the bathroom of the house in Tallaght.

Gardaí believe members of the INLA-led gang had kidnapped the man and were about to severely beat him after he had failed to comply with extortion demands.

He had already sustained a number of injuries by the time he was rescued by gardaí.

The victim was found in the bathroom of the house at Cushlawn Drive, Tallaght, when a large team of armed officers moved in shortly before 7pm on Friday.

Members of the Special Detective Unit - who specialise in investigating paramilitary groups - backed by the Emergency Response Unit raided the house, acting on intelligence.

Some of those arrested in the operation had been under surveillance for some time.

When the armed officers moved in, they found the victim in the bathroom and nine other people in other rooms in the property.

The nine - one woman and eight men - were arrested. Aged between 19 and 34, they were taken for questioning to different Dublin Garda stations including Terenure, Rathfarnham, Tallaght and Clondalkin.

They were all detained under Section 30 of the Offences Against the State Act and can be held for up to 72 hours without charge.

The victim of the attack required medical treatment and was said to be in shock after his ordeal.

Gardaí have spoken with him, but it is understood he has been too fearful to make a full statement. He is from west Dublin.

The INLA figure arrested at the Tallaght house is in his mid-30s.

He has recently been released from prison after serving a lengthy sentence for his role in one of the most violent gang fights ever witnessed in Dublin.

An associate of the leading INLA figure lost his life in the fight.

The INLA figure has been at the centre of a number of Garda investigations since his release from prison.

Gardaí believe he has been at the centre of an extortion racket involving demands for money from people, mostly Dublin-based drug dealers.

The man is the chief suspect in a grenade attack on a house in the Coombe in late June.

Gardaí believe the suspect became involved in a dispute with minor drug dealers from the area and was attempting to extort money from them by targeting them in a grenade attack.

A specialist Garda operation was established around the same time to investigate the origins of a number of explosive devices used in Dublin and other parts of the country this year.

Gardaí believe the INLA suspect played a role in sourcing at least some of those devices.

Two of those attacks, both in Dublin, involved the use of fragmentation grenades believed to have come from the Balkans.