Special police unit to investigate Belfast rioting

A special police unit has been set up to identify those involved in the St Patrick’s Day riots in the Holylands area of Belfast…

A special police unit has been set up to identify those involved in the St Patrick’s Day riots in the Holylands area of Belfast.

Working alongside representatives from the universities, the dedicated PSNI team will trawl through hours of CCTV footage of the drunken disturbances in the student flat land.

Nineteen men were arrested during the trouble, with eight of those having since been charged with public order offences. Reports on the other 11 are being prepared for the Public Prosecution Service.

Hundreds of people were involved in the all-day parties that turned ugly on Tuesday.

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Police now want to identify those people captured on CCTV throwing bottles, fireworks and other missiles at officers.

Detective Inspector Chris Millar, who will be leading the team when it begins work on Monday, said it was important to send a message to both the community and students that such behaviour would not be tolerated. “We are taking Tuesday’s events very seriously and are setting up a special enquiries team to investigate the incident,” he said.

“It is important that those responsible for terrorising their neighbours, injuring police officers and causing wanton destruction understand that their behaviour has consequences. My team will be collating and analysing CCTV footage. We will also be working closely with the universities and other partner agencies to identify the perpetrators and bring them before the courts," he said.