A Dublin man at the centre of a battle with the corporation to stay in his family home was evicted yesterday morning.
Mr Michael Devereaux, formerly of Stanaway Avenue in Crumlin, was ejected at about 6.30 a.m. yesterday from the house where he was born and his parents died. He has not been offered alternative accommodation and said yesterday he would be sleeping in his car.
He has also lost his job on a building site as he had been "guarding" the house since the ejectment order came into effect last Wednesday.
The eviction came following the failure of a Labour Party councillor, Mr Eric Byrne, to get support for an emergency motion at Monday evening's City Council meeting, calling on Dublin Corporation to treat Mr Devereaux's case sympathetically.
He said five men from the City Sheriff's office "started banging on the door with sledgehammers and, when that didn't work, they came back with chainsaws". Mr Devereaux had barricaded himself inside the house and had said it would "take a tank to get [him] out".
"The bailiffs were only doing their job, didn't question me at all, just asked me if I'd leave when they did get in. I didn't challenge them then. What would have been the point?"
The eviction took about an hour, he said. "I got my own personal gear out, but my pa rents' belongings are still in there. The corporation said I could apply to get them back."
He did not have enough money to put a rent deposit on a flat and said he was not "in the humour" for contacting the housing unit at Dublin Corporation yesterday.
His fear now is that he will not be able to keep up his repayments on his car. "If I don't have that, I'll have nothing," he said.
His parents, Michael and Suzie Devereaux, had hoped Mr Devereaux would buy the house in their name from Dublin Corporation. However, they both became too ill to sign the purchase forms. Mr Devereaux did not succeed to the tenancy.
