{"id":476636,"date":"2026-05-31T21:57:07","date_gmt":"2026-05-31T21:57:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/476636\/"},"modified":"2026-05-31T21:57:07","modified_gmt":"2026-05-31T21:57:07","slug":"four-arrested-and-two-treated-in-hospital-after-brawl-at-cemetery-mass-in-co-laois-the-irish-times","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/476636\/","title":{"rendered":"Four arrested and two treated in hospital after brawl at cemetery Mass in Co Laois \u2013 The Irish Times"},"content":{"rendered":"<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">Members of the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.irishtimes.com\/tags\/garda-siochana\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer nofollow noopener\" title=\"https:\/\/www.irishtimes.com\/tags\/garda-siochana\/\">Garda<\/a> public order unit were called to an annual <a href=\"https:\/\/www.irishtimes.com\/tags\/laois\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer nofollow noopener\" title=\"https:\/\/www.irishtimes.com\/tags\/laois\/\">Co Laois<\/a> cemetery Mass after violence broke out among dozens of attendees.<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">The Mass was being held at St Peter and Paul\u2019s Cemetery in Portlaoise on Sunday afternoon. <\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">Four males, two in their 20s and two juveniles, were subsequently arrested. <\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">Two people, a man in his 20s and a juvenile male, were being treated in hospital for non-life-threatening injuries.<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">It is understood the initial fight began between a small number of attendees but quickly escalated while the blessing of graves was taking place.<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">The incident involved close to 50 people and it is understood a number of weapons, including knives, were brandished.<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">Independent councillor Caroline Dwane-Stanley, who had attended the Mass, said the \u201cscenes and disgraceful violence that took place at a packed cemetery Mass has no place in society\u201d.<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">Dwane-Stanley, who is a member of Portlaoise Cemetery Committee, was on the main gates for the annual cemetery collection. <\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">She said some committee members received \u201cterrible abuse\u201d when stopping vehicles entering the cemetery.<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">Monsignor John Byrne, the Portlaoise parish priest, called for \u201can end to such violence\u201d.<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">Byrne said consultation between garda\u00ed and Laois County Council was needed following the incident as he feared for the future of the annual event.<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">In a statement, An Garda S\u00edoch\u00e1na said members on duty at an event at Stradbally Road, Portlaoise, \u201carrested four males following a public-order incident at around 1pm\u201d.<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">The four are being detained at Garda stations in the Eastern Region and have been charged to appear before a special sitting of Portlaoise District Court on Monday at 10.30am.<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">Garda investigations are ongoing. Anyone with information that could assist the investigation is asked to contact Portlaoise Garda station at 057 8674100.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Members of the Garda public order unit were called to an annual Co Laois cemetery Mass after violence&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":205760,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[205560,61,60,43],"class_list":["post-476636","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-ireland","tag-badge-logo-crest-stock-stock-images-garda-police-garda-ie-emerge","tag-ie","tag-ireland","tag-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/476636","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=476636"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/476636\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/205760"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=476636"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=476636"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=476636"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}