{"id":523691,"date":"2026-06-07T22:06:20","date_gmt":"2026-06-07T22:06:20","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/523691\/"},"modified":"2026-06-07T22:06:20","modified_gmt":"2026-06-07T22:06:20","slug":"garda-jerry-mccabe-murder-inquiry-very-much-live-30-years-after-limerick-shooting-the-irish-times","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/523691\/","title":{"rendered":"Garda Jerry McCabe murder inquiry \u2018very much live\u2019 30 years after Limerick shooting \u2013 The Irish Times"},"content":{"rendered":"

Det Garda Jerry McCabe has been remembered 30 years after he was murdered by the IRA<\/a> in Co Limerick<\/a>.<\/p>\n

McCabe was shot dead by a republican gang during a raid on the post office in Adare<\/a> in 1996.<\/p>\n

T\u00e1naiste Simon Harris was among those who paid tribute to the father-of-five as a \u201cdedicated servant of this State, who gave his life in the line of duty\u201d. He was also remembered at a Mass in Limerick on Sunday.<\/p>\n

A senior Garda<\/a> officer said the investigation into what happened was still \u201cvery much live\u201d<\/a> and urged anyone with information to come forward.<\/p>\n

Speaking after Mass at Holy Rosary Church, McCabe\u2019s widow Ann said grief was forever.<\/p>\n

[\u00a0Miriam Lord: Sinn F\u00e9in condemned to linguistic knots over Jerry McCabeOpens in new window<\/a>\u00a0]<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s hard to believe it has been 30 years since Jerry was murdered,\u201d she said. \u201cGrief is not just for now, it is forever. My life stood still on June 7th.\u201d<\/p>\n

McCabe had been on duty with his partner Det Ben O\u2019Sullivan on June 7th, 1996, when a post office van they were escorting stopped at Adare.<\/p>\n

The patrol car pulled up close by and as the van driver prepared to unload the mail, a Provisional IRA unit crashed a 4×4 at full speed into the rear of the detectives\u2019 unmarked patrol car.<\/p>\n

\"DetDet Gda Jerry McCabe, who was killed during a post office raid 30 years ago, in 1996. <\/p>\n

Another vehicle arrived at the scene and its occupants opened fire on the Garda car, killing McCabe and seriously wounding O\u2019Sullivan, who was shot around a dozen times but survived. He died in 2022<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Four people were convicted of manslaughter in relation to the killing in 1999.<\/p>\n

Mrs McCabe commented that they were \u201cno longer part of my life\u201d.<\/p>\n

\u201cI have dealt with them. We fought a bit of a battle with them all right, and we shouldn\u2019t have had to do that, but politics came into it sadly. But we won the battle, hard as it was to deal with, but we did it as best we could.\u201d<\/p>\n

She paid tribute to her \u201cwonderful family, wonderful friends\u201d as well as all members of An Garda S\u00edoch\u00e1na and the victims\u2019 group SEFF (Supporting, Empowering, Fair, Focused) for their support.<\/p>\n

\u201cJerry loved his job, there was a lot of seriousness attached to it, but where there was Ben and Jerry, there was always laughter,\u201d she added.<\/p>\n

[\u00a0Garda Jerry McCabe\u2019s widow wants fugitive gang members to face justiceOpens in new window<\/a>\u00a0]<\/p>\n

\u201cHe was a peaceful man.\u201d<\/p>\n

She said he had a sticker on the back of his patrol car on the day he was killed which said: \u201cI\u2019m for peace.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cLittle did he know that he wouldn\u2019t live to see the [peace process] proceed the way it did,\u201d she added.<\/p>\n

Chief Supt Derek Smart of the Limerick Division said the investigation into the killing continues.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe remember Ben O\u2019Sullivan, who was also in the car that day. They were carrying out their lawful duties when they were so brutally shot down. And just to confirm that this is very much a live investigation, there are people out there who we are still anxious to speak with,\u201d he said. <\/p>\n

\u201cMy appeal would be directly to them to come forward, anybody that may have any information with regard to what happened to Jerry and Ben on that day on June 7th; please contact us, to any Garda station, our confidential number, reach out to us, give us that information, and we will assist in bringing this matter to a close for Ann.<\/p>\n

\u201cI think the world is getting to be a smaller place, people are now being brought home to face their actions, so I do believe that one day this matter will be brought to a close and the McCabe and the O\u2019Sullivan families will get the answers that they need.\u201d<\/p>\n

SEFF director Kenny Donaldson was among those who attended the Mass.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe McCabe family is very much held in high esteem across our organisation as an example of a family with a dedication to service with regard to Jerry, and both his son and grandson to have served in An Garda S\u00edoch\u00e1na,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s important to be with them here today because terrorism knew no borders and it came right down into this community, and today we saw the love and respect with which the family is held.\u201d<\/p>\n

Originally from Co Kerry, Mr McCabe worked as a mechanic before joining An Garda S\u00edoch\u00e1na in September 1964.<\/p>\n

He was posthumously awarded the Scott Gold Medal in 2000. \u2013 PA <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Det Garda Jerry McCabe has been remembered 30 years after he was murdered by the IRA in Co…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":523692,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[3],"tags":[4527,956,9,10,18,13,14,6,19,17,6439,11,12,1844,15,16,5,7,8],"class_list":["post-523691","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-headlines","tag-adare","tag-an-garda-siochana","tag-breaking-news","tag-breakingnews","tag-eire","tag-featured-news","tag-featurednews","tag-headlines","tag-ie","tag-ireland","tag-irish-republican-army","tag-latest-news","tag-latestnews","tag-limerick","tag-main-news","tag-mainnews","tag-news","tag-top-stories","tag-topstories"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@ie\/116711102051299694","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/523691","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=523691"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/523691\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/523692"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=523691"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=523691"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=523691"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}