Child seriously injured in Charleville attack 'doing well' following ...
A child seriously injured when masked men armed with suspected slash hooks broke into her Cork home is recovering in hospital following emergency surgery.
The 12-year-old girl was in her home in Charleville, north Cork, on Monday night when five men in balaclavas started attacking a car outside and then broke into the house.
The men were armed with suspected slash hooks and left the girl so badly injured that she was transferred for emergency surgery from Cork University Hospital to Children’s Health Ireland at Temple Street in Dublin with a suspected fractured skull and brain bleed.
But the child “is doing very well” following an operation and any brain bleed has been stymied.
“They're very hopeful that she'll make a full recovery,” Superintendent Gary McPolin, who is overseeing the investigation, said.
It’s suspected that the child was injured as part of an ongoing feud between warring families in Cork and Limerick.
She was in her home with her young siblings and mother when armed masked men started attacking the house and broke the door down, injuring her in the process, it is understood.
The suspects then fled the scene in a black car towards Kilmallock, Co Limerick.
Gardaí in Cork are working with gardaí in Limerick on the investigation.
No arrests have been made as of yet, but gardaí are following a definite line of inquiry. File picture: Niall Carson/PA Wire“This happened on a Monday night, it's unacceptable, inexcusable, and will not be tolerated, either by the local people or by the gardaí," Supt McPolin said.
“Their violent actions led to the serious injury of a child.
The people in Charleville are completely disgusted with what’s happened in their town. It’s a very law-abiding town with very decent people who have very good relationships with the guards and vice versa.
No arrests have been made as of yet, but gardaí are following a definite line of inquiry into the assault and a linked incident of criminal damage at the house on the New Line, just off main street in Charleville.
Detectives are working to establish a motive for the attack which it is believed may be linked to a feud involving families in Cork and Limerick.
One strand of the investigation is exploring if the Charleville incident was in retaliation for a similar incident earlier this month when a gang attacked a car and a house in Patrickswell in Co Limerick.
Supt McPolin issued a specific appeal for anyone who may have witnessed the incident, for anyone who may have been in or around the New Line area of Charleville on Monday between 10.30pm and midnight, or to anyone with camera footage, including dash-cam footage, from the area at the time to contact the investigation team at Mallow Garda Station at 022 31450, the Garda Confidential Line at 1800 666 111, or any Garda Station.
“Anybody that can assist us in this investigation has a moral obligation, they are duty bound in a case like this, to assist us. There can be no bystander apathy here,” he said.
