It was comforting reading. Ireland came out as the third most peaceful country in the world in a recent survey.
Cold comfort for the American tourist who was beaten to within an inch of his life on a Dublin street last week.
As the Irish Times reported: "Gardaí are searching for three youths who attacked a tourist in Dublin city centre on Wednesday night, leaving him with “life-changing injuries.”
"The 57-year-old, who was visiting Ireland from the United States, had just left his accommodation on Talbot Street when he was set upon by the group on Talbot Place which leads on to Store Street.
"The attack has been widely condemned, with local representatives blaming a lack of Garda presence in the area. It comes three weeks after a 23-year-old Ukrainian actor was attacked, glassed and bitten a few hundred metres away after acting in a play in the Abbey Theatre.
"Minister for Justice Helen McEntee condemned the latest attack 'in the strongest terms' and said her thoughts 'are with the victim and his family at this time.'
Presumably her prayers too. This sounds a bit like the line we get from the gun crowd in the U.S. after a mass shooting. Thoughts and prayers and nothing done.
In Dublin, it would appear that not enough is done in the face of "Clockwork Orange" violence which, luckily, doesn't typically involve guns.
But you don't need guns, knives or broken bottles to kill or injure a person to the point of the injuries sustained being "life changing."
The Irish Times further reported: "It is understood the group of attackers, aged in their late teens, kicked and punched the victim, including as he lay on the ground, in what sources described as an 'entirely unprovoked' attack.
"The attackers fled and gardaí and emergency services arrived on the scene a short time later. The man was taken to Beaumont Hospital where he is being treated in intensive care.
"Gardaí are confident they have identified at least one the three attackers who are suspected of being involved in other assaults in the area in the recent past. They are believed to live in the local area.
"Investigators are harvesting CCTV footage from the area and have appealed for witnesses to come forward. No arrests have been made."
By the time these lines are being read hopefully the thugs are in custody.
The fact that they are suspected in other attacks and were still running amok when they encountered the unfortunate American visitor does not make for comforting reading, however.
Dublin being a town where you have to watch your back in some parts is nothing new.
Thirty years ago, Senator David Norris, a civil rights campaigner and longtime member of Seanad Éireann, said in the Senate chamber: "There is an onus on us to ensure that the guardians of law and order are protected. We have reached the point where the balance of advantage has been taken from the gardaí and given to the criminals. As a university student I recall seeing Garda 'Lugs' Branigan in the Olympic Ballroom. He parted the hordes like the Dead Sea to take three people who were in front of the band stand into the back alley and rendered his own justice. Nobody protested. I am not suggesting that we return to those days but I believe that the balance has gone too far in the other direction."
Norris was referring to Garda Sergeant James Branigan, known to all as "Lugs." A boxer in his youth, Branigan was something of a legend in Dublin crime fighting during the 1950s and 60s. He was a Dublin version of Wyatt Earp minus the guns. The story goes that he would offer those he apprehended a choice: a box in the face, or a day in court.
Not infrequently it was more than one box.
A Lugs Branigan on the streets of Dublin these times would probably not last long in the job but it's hard not to imagine many Dubliners regretting the fact that a present day Lugs wasn't close at hand when the American tourist was on the ground and under merciless onslaught from three individuals who should not be loose on any street.
Dublin's citizens deserve better than all this. Dublin's visitors deserve better.
Okay, so is not a time for Lugs Branigan-style policing. But neither is it a time for the "Car 54 Where Are You" version.
Undercover street policing would be helpful. And more CCTV where there are gaps. And communities should not tolerate thugs in their midst. Witnesses, and those with information, should indeed come forward, regularly and often.
