IRISH MURDER GANGS BECOME BOLDER

Manawatu Times, Volume LIV, Issue 6626, 12 August 1931, Page 7

IRISH MURDER GANGS BECOME BOLDER

Minister’s Warning

•JURIES MAY BE ABOLISHES

United Press Association. —By Electric Telegraph.—Copyright. Received Tuesday, 9.30 p.m. LONDON, Aug. 11.

“Undoubtedly the underground organisations in the Irish Free State arc becoming bolder. They are drilling and committing outrages under the noses of the police who afe unable to cope with the increasing menace of lawlessness owing to the conspiracy of silence among the general population which is afraid to perform its civil duty owing to terrorism and intimidation of jurors,’’ says the Minister of Justice, Mr. Kenny. “The Government is aw'are that the so-called Republican army is drilling and i§ determined to hold the murder gaug in check and prevent a repetition of the murders which have blackened the history of the Free State.’’ The Ministry is gravely concerned over the recrudescence of shooting and is introducing a new Polico Bill with pow'er to abolish jury trials and create a tribunal to order hanging and permitting the use of the army to co-oper-ate with the civic guards in suppressing widespread illegal drilling by the Irish Republican Army.