GARDAÍ INVESTIGATING the shooting dead of teenager Paul McCarthy are trying to establish the origins of a gun that killed him and another weapon which was later found during a search of the murder scene.
Detectives were last night still holding three men who presented themselves to a Garda station on Tuesday evening for questioning in connection with the killing. They were known to McCarthy.
All three are believed to have been at the scene when the 19-year-old was shot in the head in a bedroom of a house on Myra Close, Inchicore, south Dublin, on Monday.
When gardaí arrived at the scene at 2.50pm they found McCarthy in the bedroom with a gunshot wound to the head. He was still alive and was taken by ambulance to St James’s Hospital. He was transferred to Beaumont Hospital, where efforts to save him failed. He was pronounced dead on Monday evening.
A Garda search of the area close to the crime scene yielded a loaded handgun. Gardaí believe it was the weapon used in the fatal shooting. When gardaí searched the room where the shooting took place they found a second handgun, which was not fired during the incident on Monday.
Gardaí are trying to establish if McCarthy or any of the three men being questioned last night were storing the guns for one of the drug gangs involved in a gangland feud in Crumlin and Drimnagh.
One theory being explored by gardaí is that the guns were being stored for a gang member and that McCarthy and the three arrested men were examining one of the guns but did not realise it was loaded and readied for firing.
One of the men is believed to have pointed the gun at McCarthy’s head not realising how easily it would discharge.
Gardaí are working on the theory that when the gun was discharged, and Mr McCarthy wounded in the head, the three men panicked and ran, with one of them throwing the gun away.
Immediately after the incident came to light, gardaí established the identities of the three men and by liaising with their families managed to contact them.
The men on Tuesday evening presented themselves for questioning at Kilmainham Garda station, where they were arrested. They were detained overnight at Kevin Street, Pearse Street and Harcourt Terrace Garda stations.
All three were arrested under Section 50 of the Offences Against the State Act, and can be held for up to seven days without charge.
While McCarthy was not regarded as a serious gangland criminal, he was linked to one of the two feuding gangs in Crumlin and Drimnagh. In February he was caught by gardaí with a Glock handgun and a quantity of cocaine. The haul is believed to have belonged to one of the feuding gangs but was being held for the gang by McCarthy.
