Pub-goer helped barman after shooting
A young man celebrating his 21st birthday took off his t-shirt to wrap around a barman wounded during an armed robbery, it emerged today.
The incident, which left the barman seriously ill in hospital, took place in the Lagoona bar in Dublin’s financial district.
Two masked raiders burst into the bar at around 10.30pm last night, armed with a handgun and a sawn-off shotgun.
One of them held up and threatened around 20 customers who were drinking in the bar. The other demanded cash from staff and shot a 24-year-old barman, who is from Poland, in the shoulder.
After the gunmen left, a young man marking his 21st birthday went to the barman’s assistance.
“He jumped up and put his t-shirt on the man’s body to tie the wound for him,” said an acquaintance of the man’s family.
He added that the family had been shocked by the incident.
“They saw the whole thing. They said it was very scary.”
The gunmen escaped from the bar through the front door and climbed over a nearby metal fence. But they left the bag of cash takings behind.
The barman was taken by ambulance to Beaumont Hospital, where a spokeswoman said he was in a "serious but stable" condition.
Detectives from Store Street garda station sealed off the scene for technical examination and began examining CCTV evidence from the bar and the surrounding area.
The Lagoona Bar is located on Custom House Square in the International Financial Services Centre (IFSC), directly opposite the National College of Ireland.
Its owner, Thomas Smith, was robbed at gunpoint in the early hours of St Patrick’s Day as he returned to his home in Castleknock in Dublin with €40,000 of takings.
The raiders drove off in a silver Volkswagon Passat car and were pursued by the Garda helicopter.
Gardaí arrested the men in Mulhuddart in North Dublin after a 30-minute high-speed chase. They were later charged in connection with the robbery at Dublin District Court.
Mr Smith is also the owner of two pubs in Templebar, Farringtons and The Auld Dubliner.
