Gardaí in Cork have arrested 17 people for a variety of offences including suspected possession of child pornography, assault, burglary, theft, drug possession and breaches of immigration law.
The arrests were carried out on Thursday as part of Operation Thor, which was initially set up to tackle rural burglaries.
A man in his 40s was arrested in relation to suspected possession of child pornography in Ovens, Co Cork. He was detained at Gurranabraher Garda Station on the north side of Cork city and has since been released. A file will now be prepared for the DPP.
Five people were arrested for immigration offences and have since been returned to Spain. Three people were arrested on foot of bench warrants and were brought before the courts. Eight people were arrested for drugs, burglary and theft offences. They have all since been released and a file will be prepared for the DPP.
A total of six premises were searched under warrant which resulted in the seizure of small quantities of suspected MDMA, cocaine and cannabis.
The operations conducted were carried out by local gardaí along with members of the Immigration Unit, Drugs Units, Roads Policing Unit, Dog Unit and the Armed Support Unit.
As part of the day of action, four checkpoints were carried out on Wellington Road, Middle Glanmire Road, South Link Road and North Ring Road in Cork city.
Over 2,000 vehicles passed through the checkpoints with ten road traffic offences detected. Community Policing Units were out giving advice to cyclists about bicycle safety and crime prevention. Gardaí also spoke to members of the public about how they can keep their home more secure coming up to the winter months, the Garda said a statement summarising the day’s activity.