It was all over in about three minutes, according to Lady Beit's driver. Mr Niall Cummins was driving her car back to the car-park as he passed the front of Russborough House just after 12.30 p.m. yesterday. A man dressed all in black and wearing a balaclava was driving a Mitsubishi Pajero jeep up the steps of the house to ram the front door. He was one of three raiders.
"There was one driving up the steps at that stage and hitting the front door. The other had a handgun," said Mr Cummins. A third, the driver of a light blue Volkswagen Golf GTI, had assembled a makeshift lever with two blocks of wood to ram through the door.
"I didn't see the paintings coming out. I ran in here," he said, pointing toward the souvenir shop at the side of the house, "to talk to staff. Then when I came back out they were driving down there," he added, gesturing towards the gravel drive.
The raiders knew exactly what they were looking for, according to Chief Supt Sean Feely of Naas, who is heading the investigation. Having rammed the front door the three entered the main hall. They walked past the drawing room and into the music room where the two paintings - Madame Baccelli: Dancer, by Thomas Gainsborough and View Of Florence Looking Towards the Ponte Vecchio, by Bernardo Bellotto - were hanging.
The raiders then took the paintings and left, putting them in the back seat of the Volkswagen. Before they left, one poured petrol in the interior of the jeep and set it on fire.
The jeep had been reported missing from Crumlin in Dublin on Monday, and the Volkswagen Golf would probably be reported stolen, said Chief Supt Feely. On their way out to the main road the raiders tried unsuccessfully to hijack a car. The Volkswagen was burnt out, and from this point gardai are unsure how the raiders proceeded.
Gardai carried out searches of the woods and surrounding area and manned 12 checkpoints established in Cos Wicklow, Kildare and Dublin.
The paintings were almost certainly stolen to order, and it is thought a criminal gang was behind the robbery rather than a subversive organisation.