FOURTEEN Limerick city brothels were targeted and searched by specially trained gardai as part of a nationwide swoop on prostitution.
With over 200 gardai working on Operation Quest in a cross border joint jurisdictional effort to combat an eastern European prostitution ring, prostitutes working in the city were interviewed and questioned, with documents, phones and laptops seized for analysis.
Operation Quest was set up towards securing convictions against those involved in organising prostitution, brothel keeping and associated offences, including money laundering.
A garda spokesperson said: “The operation which commenced at midday on Tuesday last, has so far resulted in the search of over 100 premises (mainly apartments, flats and houses) in the Republic.
“Three people have been arrested, a man aged in his 40s and two females in their 20s are currently detained under Section 4 of the Criminal Justice Act, 1984”.
Members of the Organised Crime Unit based at the National Bureau of Criminal Investigation, supported by officers from all Garda Regions, led the operation.
Last month, a major figure in the operation of brothels in the south of the country, including six in Limerick, was charged before the courts, and the gardai say that they are continuing their efforts to secure convictions against the chief organisers of prostitution.
Offers of prostitution and the provision of professional sexual services, have also been linked to a number of Irish females.
The Limerick Post has been alerted that a father of two, aged in his 50s, was offered ‘services’ from “a girl no more than 16 or 17, at the doors of a bank in the nortside of the city. It is claimed the girl offered sex
The man in question told the Post that the girl, believed to be a local, offered a business card.
Gardai have confirmed that prostitution is organised on a cross-border basis and Operation Quest was “specifically aimed at individuals and groups intent on making profits from vulnerable members of society across the island of Ireland”.
Meanwhile, Denise Charlton, CEO of the Immigrant Council, said:
“The efforts of the Gardaí and the PSNI in helping women who have been trafficked into Ireland by criminal gangs to be trapped into a life in brothels are very welcome and organisations such as ourselves stand ready to help any victims rescued during this operation.
“We await the full details of the operation and the details of the numbers of prosecutions to follow.
“The size of the operation, covering almost every county, shows how those behind this sleazy trade have used a legal loophole to reach into every part of our country. While law enforcement efforts such as that now unfolding are important, if we seriously want to shut down the brothels and protect the women involved then law reform is the only answer”.
