Ireland's Eye

County news from Ireland

Ireland's Eye

June 25, 2008

Pervert Targets Boys

A FOUR-year old boy from Drogheda was bribed by a stranger to take his clothes off. The serious incident occurred when two children, who are relatives, were playing outside a house in Lourdes Square.

A “black or dark man” according to the children approached them and persuaded them to walk away with him.

During the journey to the laneway that is overlooked by some of the houses in Parkview, the man held the hand of one of the children.

When they got to the laneway, which is quiet, the man asked one of the boys to remove some of his clothing.

Gardai (police) were unwilling to confirm which items were taken off by the small child.

Afterwards, the man gave the boy “a small sum of money,” according to Gardai.

Both boys returned to Lourdes Square and continued playing. It was some time before they told an adult what had happened.

Neither of them is particularly traumatized according to Gardai. But they want to find this man as soon as possible.

A Garda spokesperson warned parents that all children should be supervised by an adult when they are playing outside, even in a garden with locked gates. Adults must keep an eye on their children at all times.

“People should remember that there are people who are on the sex offenders register living in Drogheda. Many people feel that Drogheda is not the type of place where these incidents will happen, but these incidents can happen anywhere. Parents should always be on the alert,” said the spokesperson.

Drogheda Independent

Senior Citizen Carjacked

AN elderly woman is recovering following a terrifying carjacking ordeal in Ratoath.

The 72-year-old woman was a passenger in a car on Main Street at around 8 p.m. on Thursday when a young man got into the driver’s seat and drove off with her still inside. The woman’s husband was in a nearby takeaway. He had left the car’s engine running while he went inside.

The carjacker drove off in the direction of Ratoath National School but crashed the vehicle into a pole at Meadowbank Hill. The elderly passenger was taken to hospital suffering from shock.

The man fled through back gardens in the Meadowbank Hill area, but local residents contacted Gardai as to his whereabouts. A man was arrested in the estate a short time later.

A man has been charged in connection with the incident and is currently in custody in Clover Hill Prison in Dublin.

Meath Chronicle

Hero Seeks Reunion

A FORMER U.S. sailor is looking to get in touch with the boy he rescued from the River Foyle more than 40 years ago.

On May 10, 1963, Victor Campau, who was a commissary man first class on board the American Submarine USS Threadfin, became a local hero when he saved 12-year-old Derry boy Arthur Palmer, who fell into the Foyle while watching the submarine dock.

The boy was one of hundreds of locals who gathered on the docks to watch ships and submarines arrive in the city as part in a NATO operation. He fell off the edge of the docks and landed on the top of the Threadfin before bouncing into the water between the boat and the docks.

Campau spotted the boy fall and immediately dived into the water and dragged him to safety. The boy was then taken to the crew’s mess, dried off and given some old dungarees to wear.

Campau was later awarded the Navy Commendation Medal for his bravery and received the following citation: “In risking his own life to save that of another, Campau displayed initiative, promptness and courage in keeping with the highest traditions of the U.S. Navy.”

Now, the 78-year-old ex-submariner wants to find out what became of the boy he saved.

“It would just mean so much to know how he is,” he says.

The report in the naval magazine charting Vic Campau’s deed concluded by telling what happened as the Threadfin left Derry, “A large crowd gathered on the dock and, as Threadfin made her turn to proceed down the river, they gave a loud cheer. All hands knew that cheer was for Vic Campau, who had so unselfishly risked his life to save one of their own.”

Derry Journal

Strawberry Thieves

A FAMILY fruit farm has stopped allowing people to pick their own strawberries because customers were eating too many of the fruits without paying.

Hacker’s Fruit Farm, near Cambridge, has offered locals the chance to pick their own strawberries for 40 years.

But Mark Spight, who runs the farm, said that he was getting sick of watching people eat up to £15 worth of strawberries with clearly no intention of paying for them.

“The cheek of people was unbelievable. People were treating it like a giant open buffet. We’d expect to make about £40,000 during the strawberry season but we lost £10,000 of that to greedy gorgers,” Spight said.

“One woman came up to the counter, covered in juice on her trousers, up her arms and even in her hair. But she handed over a punnet with four strawberries in,” he added.

Spight said he had even spotted one family “sitting in the field with a bowl of water to wash them in and a bowl of cream that they then dipped them in.”

The farm has grown strawberries for 85 years and enjoyed its heyday in the mid-1980s, when the fruit covered 20 of its 35 acres. In time, however, competition from supermarkets in Cambridge caused the size of the farm to diminish to just four acres, with the rest rented out to grow wheat.

Spight took over the farm five years ago from his wife Hayley’s father and two uncles. They, in turn, had inherited the farm from their parents.

Now, however, with a gloomy economic climate and food prices around the world inflating fast, Spight can no longer afford to be lenient in enforcing his “pick your own” policy. He claims it was costing his family up to £225 a day.

“Children would play in the fields ripping up the green fruit and throwing them at each other, but the parents would get defensive if you confronted them. It’s vandalism. You wouldn’t do that in Tesco.”

Spight’s strawberries, which cost just £1 for a pound, are now being replaced by rows of berries, including gooseberries, loganberries, tayberries and currants.

The berries’ acidic taste will mean they, unlike the strawberries, will continue to be sold on a “pick your own” basis.

“We still allow ‘pick your own’ for the berries as they are far too sharp for people to gorge themselves on,” Spight said. “But we will only allow in people who look likely to behave.”

Belfast Telegraph

Death of an Angel

LAST week just outside Letterkenny three-month-old Neisha Meehan died with her young mother in an horrific road crash.

Kerry-Ann Meehan was also too young to die. She was just 16.

Her 18-year-old partner and little Neisha’s dad Christopher Hanlon was fighting for his life in hospital.

It was another week of tragedy on Donegal’s roads that, for many who knew the latest victims, was almost impossible to put into words.

Kevin Campbell, a councilor from the Creggan area of Derry where Kerry-Ann was originally from, tried to sum up the mood in two counties.

“It is the kind of tragedy that punctures the entire community,” he said.

“Kerry-Ann was just 16, and to die like that with her newborn baby is just beyond words, just absolutely awful.”

The young couple and their baby were caught up in a road crash at Tullygay when their Toyota Corolla car collided with a jeep towing a trailer load of sheep.

They had recently rented a flat in Doochary and were returning home after a day out in Letterkenny.

Lettermacaward postmaster Brian Cannon had waved to the family just hours before the crash.

“I saw Christopher in Letterkenny on Monday and he waved to me. Everyone is in absolute shock. He is a very well-mannered and well-behaved young fellow,” said Cannon.

Donegal Democrat

No Gay Basher

THE mother of a Sligo man who was jailed for eight years for an attack on an American gay writer said her son was not a “gay basher.”

Ian Monaghan was given the jail sentence at Sligo Circuit Court along with another Sligo man after an attack on Robert Drake in Holborn Street almost 10 years ago.

Drake was left crippled in a wheelchair but said he bore no ill will towards his attackers who were released from prison earlier this year.

Joan Monaghan said that she had “got eight years as well” when he was jailed for the attack. She added that her son Ian used to “pray” for Drake when he was in prison.

“He (Robert Drake) has a life sentence as well but it is not as if the boys went in and deliberately attacked him. I feel very sorry for that man. But he should not have brought them into the house. He had his own friends,” she said.

Monaghan and his co-defendant claimed in court that Drake had made improper advances towards them.

Mrs. Monaghan said she could not understand why her son was given eight years and some people only get half of that sentence for murder.

She told a local radio station that Drake had written a letter to the two men in prison saying he had nothing bitter against them. “I can either get better or get bitter,” he said.

“Robert Drake’s people who are Quakers also visited Ian in prison and said they had no hard feelings against him. They were lovely people to come all the way from America to visit the boys. And Robert Drake wrote them a letter which was very nice also,” she said.

“Ian is now just getting on with his life. If he could turn back the clock he would never, ever have gone into that house. He was never in trouble before. Ian is a nice, easy going young fellow.

“I still feel very sorry for Robert Drake and I just want to say that it was not a gay bashing.”

Sligo Weekender

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