Weavers Grange: Homes attacked in Newtownards housing estate

The words "UVF not welcome" were sprayed on some of the houses that were targeted

Windows have been smashed and graffiti has been sprayed on four homes in the Weavers Grange housing estate in Newtownards, County Down.

The damage was discovered by a passing police patrol at about 01:30 BST on Friday, a Police Service of Northern Ireland (PSNI) statement said.

The graffiti referred to the loyalist paramilitary group, the Ulster Volunteer Force (UVF).

It follows a number of incidents in Weavers Grange earlier this year.

A PSNI spokeswoman confirmed that no-one was in any of the houses at the time the attacks took place.

Some of the damaged windows have been boarded up after the overnight attack

Officers have described the latest attack as criminal damage and they have appealed for witnesses.

The Newtownards housing estate has been caught up in a drugs feud between rival paramilitary factions which spread across several towns and villages in north County Down in the spring.

Police were at the scene in Weaver's Grange on Friday morning

Previous incidents

On 6 April, a crowd of more than 50 men entered Weaver's Grange and removed paramilitary murals and signs relating to the South East Antrim Ulster Defence Association (UDA) from the gable walls of houses.

Two days later, detectives from the Paramilitary Crime Task Force searched Weaver's Grange and seized suspected Class A drugs from one house, while police found a number of petrol bombs on nearby waste ground.

On 1 May, a petrol bomb was thrown at a car parked outside a property in Weavers Grange in the middle of the night.

Three weeks later, on the night of 22 May, a car parked near Weavers Grange was destroyed in another petrol bomb attack.

At that time, the police said that attack may have been linked to an "ongoing feud between rival drug gangs across Ards and north Down".

Weavers Grange is a relatively new housing estate

The cost of policing the north Down feud has been a significant drain on the PSNI's resources, according to a senior officer.

In the summer, Assistant Chief Constable Bobby Singleton revealed that £476,000 had been spent on policing the operation from March until 31 May.