There have been further calls for the presence of more gardai in a local village ahead of the summer months as “disturbing scenes” continue to unravel there.
Locals in Malahide, north Dublin have been concerned about the amount of anti-social behaviour happening in recent weeks involving groups of youths.
In the latest shocking incident, a brawl between gangs of youths spilled out onto the street in the middle of the quiet village, Dublin Live reports.
Footage circulating on social media shows gangs trading punches in front of stunned onlookers.
The coastal north Dublin village was the scene of a number of shocking anti-social behaviour last week.
A group of youths were filmed jumping on the roof of a car while a family, including a child, were inside last Saturday.
In a separate incident on the same day, a teenager was taken to hospital after he was assaulted in the village.
Fine Gael TD Alan Farrell slammed the horrifying scenes which he said can no longer be tolerated.
He took to Twitter to say: “More disturbing scenes this evening in Malahide. Gardai on the scene promptly and public order units have been deployed to the village and elsewhere.
"Arrests have been made.
“In recent weeks I have spent considerable time speaking to Gardai, both locally and at divisional level, including a one hour call with the Chief Superintendent last night.
“We need more Gardai locally and we will be getting them shortly.
“More personnel remains my priority, this has been the case since Templemore was reopened in 2013.
“The disastrous consequences of the decision to close the training college is still evident today.
“These almost weekly events can’t be tolerated and I would ask parents to please ask their teens to stay local, for their own safety and security.
The Fingal representative added the summer season is going to be busy and more gardai need to be hired ahead of time.
He continued: “This summer promises to be a very busy time locally.
“I know we have the support of divisional Garda HQ at getting more personnel and I want to make sure the coming increase is sustained in order to guarantee a 24/7 public station.”
Gardai were contacted for comment.
Earlier in the week, Social Democrats councillor for Howth and Malahide, Joan Hopkins also said that more Gardai are required on the streets of Malahide.
She told Newstalk: "We have 40% less Guards in Ireland than the EU average, we need our Garda stations to open longer hours.
"The fact that this particular incident, this most recent incident, happened right outside Malahide Garda station it would really kind of frighten you a little bit.
"What I'd like to see is more dedicated community police: Guards that are consistently posted to one station, that they're out and about, they're visible, they're getting to know the kids and the parents and the community.
"And youth officers as well - we don't have youth officers - so when they see a kid getting into trouble they can intervene, so that we're preventing these kinds of things from happening.”
