The more things change...

Curious line in today's RTÉ report today about the number of people in the direct provision system.

RTÉ says of the 20,001 people living in direct provision and emergency international protection accommodation, 5,064 have been awarded international protection.

However, last December it was reported that more than 3,000 asylum seekers had benefited from Helen McEntee's blanket amnesty scheme for illegals in 2022 which included a separate, less publicised track for asylum seekers.

So I'm left wondering does this 5,064 figure include these 3,000 beneficiaries of McEntee's amnesty because they were not awarded international protection. They were not granted refugee status or subsidiary protection. They were just told they could stay as a result of being in the country for over two years.

It's possible these 3,000 have already moved out of direct provision and found homes, but I doubt it.

The Irish Times report, being more careful perhaps, just referred to the 5,064 as 'people with status to live in Ireland'.

A Mater Hospital cleaner who was jailed for five years for possessing child-abuse material had passed garda vetting despite convictions abroad for sexual corruption and abduction of a child, it has emerged.

An Garda Síochána were asked by the Irish Independent how a person with convictions abroad could be passed by the garda vetting procedure. No answer was available at the time of publication.

https://m.independent.ie/irish-news/news/convicted-child-abductor-passed-garda-vetting-to-get-job-in-mater-hospital-42382501.html

The man who sexually assaulted a 50-year-old woman out walking her dog in a Fermoy park had only just been released from prison for raping a 14-year-old in Moldova before arriving here to take up work in a meat factory, as he is entitled to do under EU freedom of movement rules, being the bearer of an EU passport — a Romanian one.

Similarly the suspect who was arrested (and shortly released on bail) for allegedly attempting to abduct a child in Ballymun last month was also Moldovan, and he also had arrived here on a Romanian passport.

The suspect who was arrested in December for the alleged rape of a young woman who had been celebrating a 21st birthday also in Fermoy was also Moldovan. No details on him yet but there's a fair chance he was also 'Romanian' on paper.

A Moldovan working here told me once that Romanian passports are so easy to get that he could arrange to get me one if I wanted — a real one. Friendly guy, but I declined. Apparently, over quarter of Moldovans now have them.

Today, inside the male toilets in Jervis Street Shopping Centre, an Eastern European man thought he could masterbate in front of me. He thought wrong. I chased him out of the toilets and apprehended him until security and the Gardai arrived. I overheard that this is not the first time he has done something like this. I was told I will be contacted to make a statement. Who will he do this to next? You? Your brother? Your son? This. Has. To. Stop.

Anto Boyle says that he overheard it wasn't the first time the man in the post above (centre pic) had been arrested for a similar act.

He looks very like Romanian national Ionas Carolea who pleaded guilty in Sep 2022 to masturbating in front of two undercover gardaí in the public toilets of the Marks & Spencers on Mary St in Dublin after gardaí set up a surveillance operation in the toilets which resulted in the arrest of several men for similar behaviour. Gay Community News criticised the arrests at the time.

Carolea was fined €500 after his defence solictor told the court he had attended psychotherapy, resulting in an extensive report and that it wouldn't happen again.

In March 2023, Carolea was given an 8 month suspended sentence for groping an M&S employee who was washing his hands in these same toilets after trying to open the man's zipper. Carolea had emerged from one of the cubicles masturbating before the assault. This was one of the incidents which lead to the surveillance operation being set up.

Management at the Mater Hospital are are now investigating how a Romanian man managed to pass Garda vetting and get a job at the hospital despite convictions for sexual corruption and abduction of a child, and a five-year jail sentence for possessing child abuse material.

The cleaning company which hired the man had followed all processes required for any individual to work onsite at the Mater, including Garda vetting.

A garda spokesman told Dublin Live: "An Garda Síochána cannot provide details of or comment on the personal information of any named individual. Vetting is carried out in accordance with the National Vetting Bureau Act 2012."

This is the classic excuse the govt always use to avoid having to explain themselves — that they can't comment on individual cases when all we need to know is how an EU citizen with a conviction for child abduction and the possession of child abuse material was able to pass the garda vetting procedure so we can identify any faults in it.

🔗 dublinlive.ie

Rory Clarke speaking at the Bailieborough Says No protest on Sunday:

"Everyone knows the mothering nature of Irish people, but we've been made fools of now!"

Clarke made reference to a recent news report of a Roma man who was found guilty of sexually assaulting a three-year-old in a homeless shelter which he and his family were also staying in.

The man told gardaí that pulling out children's penises and playing with their testicles was regarded as 'playful' activity in the Roma community.

The man held a number of convictions including theft, assault and robbery in another jurisdiction and had to be extradited from the UK.

Clarke told the crowd that if a 'scumbag' like that touched their children, it could destroy their lives forever, but he said the politicians in Bailieborough were happy to let them move to Ireland.

"Wouldn't it be be better to be called racist than have your children, sexually abused, raped or murdered?"

🔗 facebook.com