A MASSIVE Garda operation this week, which involved searches at three Galway locations, targeted a large gang that are understood to be involved in drugs, shootings, as well as petrol bomb and arson attacks over the past year.

The Garda early-morning swoops took place in Tuam, Moycullen and Galway city shortly after 6am on Monday morning last involving a number of police units.

Operation Trinomial – targeting organised crime gangs across Galway city and county – has resulted in a financial ‘hit’ against the gang on Monday, understood to be around €1.2 million.

Two bank accounts – one in Ireland and the other outside of the country – were frozen as a result of the operation, involving a total of €995,000.

One of the accounts had a crypto currency total of €530,000 and the other contained €465,000 in cash. In one of the house searches, a sum of €75,000 in cash was seized. Three vehicles – a VW Tiguan jeep, an Audi A5 car and a Ford Transit van – were also seized by Gardaí from the Divisional Crime, Drugs, Search, Dog Unit and National Criminal Bureau who took part in the operation.

Garda Detective Superintendent, Shane Cummins, told the Connacht Tribune that Monday’s operation was part of the ongoing campaign to tackle organised crime across the city and county.

“The target of this particular operation were the receipts of organised crime and it yielded well over one million euro.

“This is just part of the ongoing operations and we expect that arrests will also be made over the coming weeks,” said Det. Supt. Cummins.

Caption: Some of the good seized by Gardaí in Galway in this week’s crackdown.

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