Four men stopped by gardaí in Co Offaly and found to be in possession of a sub-machine gun, a shotgun and ammunition shortly after midnight on Wednesday have appeared at a special sitting of Portlaoise District Court.
All four were charged under the Firearms Act as well as breaching the Covid-19 Health Act at River Street, Clara.
The men before the court were Hugo Henrique Rodgiues (23) with an address at Inny, Ballymahon, Longford.
Ildomar Cabrar De Silva (29), of no fixed abode; Sergio Machado Filho (34) with an address in Temple Bar in Dublin and Jefferson Dos Santos (29) with an address at Inny, Ballymahon.
Outlining the alleged facts in the case Inspector Brian Farrell from Portlaoise Garda station said gardaíintercepted a Volkswagen Passat and an Opel Insignia that were driving in convoy.
In one of the vehicles they found a sawn-off shotgun, a sub-machine gun and ammunition.
He said, in the other vehicle gardaí found a petrol can.
He said that Mr Rodgiues was the driver of the first vehicle, while Mr De Silva drove the second.
Sufficient evidence
He told judge Catherine Staines that gardaí had sufficient evidence to believe the men were going to engage in on-going feud in Tullamore between two families and that they found evidence of a home address of one of the two feuding families, that two of the defendants had been searching for on Google maps.
Insp Farrell said the feud began in the Arden View housing estate in Tullamore on April 9th with a very violent disorder incident.
He said the State was objecting to bail being granted to both Mr Rodgiues and Mr De Silva.
After hearing applications the judge refused bail. Mr Filho and Dos Santos did not request bail.
The judge went on to remanded all four men to Cloverhill District Court until the next hearing of the case on June 3rd.