A quiet rural community is in shock after a vicious assault on three elderly siblings in their home in Co Wexford at the weekend.
Mr Paddy Doyle, Mr Dennis (Dinny) Doyle and Ms Mary Doyle, all in their 70s, of Ballyduff, Camolin, were beaten when two masked raiders armed with an iron bar broke into their home at around 4 a.m. on Saturday, and demanded the day's takings from the adjoining shop.
The house was ransacked as the balaclava-clad intruders searched for money, and a struggle broke out as the two brothers put up resistance.
According to a Garda spokesman, Mr Paddy Doyle produced an unloaded gun from under a bed, but it was wrestled from him, and the assailants used it to strike him to the ground, leaving him with serious head injuries.
His brother, Mr Dinny Doyle, fought the assailants with a hatchet, apparently delivering blows to the head and body, and gardaí now believe one of the intruders suffered serious head injuries.
The raiders then made their escape empty-handed. Mr Paddy Doyle was brought to Wexford General Hospital, where he needed 16 stitches. He was kept in hospital overnight.
Mr Dinny Doyle also had to have stitches for head injuries, while his sister, Ms Mary Doyle, had to have treatment for face and back injuries after she was kicked by her assailants.
"It was just an ordeal to see them in your own home at that hour in the morning; to be beaten up," she said yesterday. "Terrible."
"Dennis fought back. He fought back very hard to protect Paddy, who they beat very badly. Paddy was gone to the ground, and Dinny was still standing up, and he gave it to them as much as he could."
She appealed for members of the public who may have noticed anything around the time of the attack to contact local gardaí.