'Go Purple Day' helps raise domestic abuse awareness in Athlone

'Go Purple Day', An Garda Siochana's national day for domestic abuse awareness, took place on Friday last, May 30.

The annual initiative was started in 2020 by Athlone Community Garda Stacey Looby as part of an effort to strengthen community partnerships between domestic abuse services and Gardai.

And it attracted strong support in Athlone this year, with a number of local businesses and organisations donning purple to show their backing for the campaign.

Gardai had a 'Go Purple Day' stand in the Athlone Towncentre shopping centre from 11am to 2pm on Friday, where they were accompanied by staff from the local Esker House Domestic Abuse Support Service.

A 'Cafe Connect' event was also held in support of the campaign at Athlone Family Resource Centre last week, which was addressed by a representative of Esker House and attended by Garda Stacey Looby and other community Gardai.

In addition, shops and businesses including Burgess Department Store, the SVP Athlone shop on Church Street, and the Athlone NCBI charity shop shared photos online of purple-themed displays for the occasion.

To mark ‘Go Purple Day’, members of the public as well as Garda personnel nationwide were encouraged to show their support by wearing something purple.

A Garda media briefing on Friday brought attention to the great work being done in this area, but also highlighted statistics showing that the issue of domestic abuse is still extremely significant in 2025.

To date this year, there have been more than 21,000 domestic abuse related contacts received by An Garda Síochána. At the end of 2024, that figure stood at 65,000.

Ireland is one of only three countries which has introduced a specific offence for coercive control, and since its introduction there have been 52 prosecutions for this crime.

The Criminal Justice (Miscellaneous Provisions) Act 2023 saw the introduction of new standalone offences for stalking, non-fatal strangulation, and non-fatal suffocation. Since the offence of non-fatal strangulation was introduced on November 1, 2023, there have been 67 prosecutions for this offence, 58 of which relate to domestic abuse.

Speaking at last Friday’s media briefing, Detective Chief Superintendent from the Garda National Protective Services Bureau, Colm Noonan, said; "Go Purple Day is a simple, yet effective initiative started by one Garda’s desire to help, which is something we see daily from dedicated Gardaí all around the country.

"I want to reassure everyone that we will listen; we will advise; we will support; and we will investigate and prosecute perpetrators," he stated.