Masked raiders held a petrol pump attendant captive and terrorised him during a raid early yesterday.
The attendant, in his 40s, was held for 15 minutes by four masked men who smashed into the 24-hour petrol station at Tinvane, Carrick-on-Suir, at 3.45 a.m.
The men wore balaclavas and were armed with iron bars and sledgehammers.
They forced their way into the petrol station by smashing through a door, then ransacked the service shop, breaking internal doors.
Garda confirmed that "a substantial amount of cash - a few thousand pounds - and cigarettes were taken in the robbery. Also yesterday morning, a "high-powered" silver car similar to the one used by the masked men was seen speeding from the scene of a robbery on a shop in Tramore. Gardai are treating the two incidents as related and confirmed they occurred within 45 minutes of each other.
Gardai believe yesterday's events are linked to a spate of robberies carried out by a Dublin criminal gang in Tipperary, Kilkenny and Waterford in recent months.
They suspect that a gang or a number of "aligned groups" were involved in the robberies on petrol stations and shops in the region.
"We are looking at Dublin-based criminals with links to criminals in the south-east," said Chief Supt Pat O'Boyle, from the Tipperary division.
Yesterday, Carrick-on-Suir gardai appealed for information on the latest incident.
They are looking for details of the silver car believed to have been in the area between 2.30 a.m. and 4 a.m.
Business people were urged not to keep cash on their premises and to install alarm systems to help prevent robberies.