She says the gangsters see themselves as "soldiers of crime", with Jesus as "the owner" of the territory they dominate.

The Jesus Christ of the Bible is not a gangster capitalist.

We were thinking it might be a Russian gangster story.

She said her twin was "shot like a gangster" in her own home, adding: "This gun crime has ripped a hole in my family and there is nothing we can do about it."

For the Irish media, the weekend's most irresistible story concerned an accused Dublin gangster known as Gerry "The Monk" Hutch, who came startlingly close to winning a seat in Dáil Éireann, the national parliament.