Source: Sunday Times (UK)
Contact:  Sun, 27 Sep 1998
Author: Phelim McAleer

CORK TEENAGER KILLED IN IEP30 FEUD OVER ECSTASY

HAZELWOOD, a middle-class housing estate near the village of Riverstown in
Co Cork, is an unlikely spot for a drug feud. Tidy and well-maintained, it
is a home to doctors, teachers, businessmen and other professionals who
work in Cork city but want to live in the country. A typical commuter
village, there are two cars outside most houses.

Last Sunday night a schoolboy was stabbed to death on one of Hazelwood's
carefully manicured lawns. Police believe he was killed over a IEP30 drug
debt.

Peter Condon, 17, died after a confrontation over ecstasy tablets involving
a friend and a 19-year-old local.

Condon and his friend went to the house of an acquaintance to sort out a
long-running dispute over a minor drug transaction, police believe.

They had given the 19-year-old IEP30 some months ago so he could buy them
ecstasy tablets. However, he failed to deliver the drugs as promised, and
the situation had been the cause of friction for some months. On Sunday
night they confronted the 19-year-old to ask for their money back in the
front garden of his mother's house in Hazelwood Avenue.

According to witnesses, a kitchen knife was produced and in the ensuing
struggle Condon and his friend were wounded.

They staggered to a nearby house where a doctor lived. She tried to revive
Condon but he died at the scene. He had suffered a single stab wound.

The second youth was taken to hospital in a stable condition. He was
released after emergency surgery to remove part of the blade of the knife,
which was embedded near his rib cage. The 19-year-old was cut on the arm.

One man has been questioned about the stabbing and a file is to be sent to
the director of public prosecutions. A second youth was arrested yesterday
on suspicion of possession of an offensive weapon.

"All three boys come from respectable, decent families," an investigating
officer said. "There is no suggestion that anyone was dealing in drugs for
profit. It is a tragedy for everyone involved."

One prominent Hazelwood resident, who asked not to be named, said the
community was shocked that a drug feud could be fought out on their own
doorstep. "It is a quiet middle-class area - most people in the estate are
working - everyone was stunned and shocked when it happened," he said. "It
was your normal quiet Sunday evening with kids playing in the driveway and
suddenly something horrific like this happens."

According to a senior source in the National Drugs Unit, ecstasy is now the
favoured recreational drug of young people. "The same way as I would go out
for a pint, they take ecstasy and it's not just in Dublin or Cork city
centre. It is everywhere - Drogheda, Sligo or Galway - anywhere there is a
club scene," he said.

Condon, a pupil at the Sacred Heart College, Carrignavar, was expected to
do well in his Leaving Certificate exams, which he was due to sit at the
end of the year.

Friends described a bright boy who was always joking, always trying to make
people laugh. He was interested in computers and rugby and played for the
local Old Christians Club.

Barry Hill, the club president, said: "I think he had left to play a bit of
soccer but had come back in the last few weeks. The club is just over his
garden fence and we always found him a quiet, jolly fellow. There would
never be any mischief out of him. We don't know what happened but he was a
great chap and would never have caused us any trouble."

Condon was the eldest son of Pat and Kay and had two sisters, Rebecca and
Lisa, and a brother Joe. His father works in the Pepsi-Cola factory on
Little Island, Cork.

One Hazelwood resident said that although life was returning to normal the
incident had left an indelible mark on the community. "Life goes on, people
get their kids to school, go to work. It's the parents I feel most sorry
for. I'm sure none of them would ever have predicted that something like
this would happen."

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Checked-by: Joel W. Johnson