A Limerick farmer says that the theft of a trailer from their yard 10 years ago has left a lasting impact on their feeling of safety in their own farm.

“I’m still bitter about it,” the farmer said.

“It happened late at night. We were all home in bed sleeping, the trailer was in the back yard and when we woke up in the morning it was gone.”

The farmer explained that the thieves would have had to have known the trailer was there because it was not visible from the road and they would have had to drive down a long, narrow laneway to the back of the farm.

“If they’d been caught they wouldn’t have been able to escape which makes me think they were being very opportunistic or knew the layout of the farm and our movements. It makes me suspect that the trailer was taken by someone we knew, either someone who’d been working on the farm or a friend of a friend who knew we had it.

“To think we were taken advantage of like that by someone who could have been invited on to the farm makes me feel sick.”

The farmer said the trailer had been a considerable financial outlay for the farm.

“We reported it to the gardaí at the time but nothing ever came of it,” the farmer said.

“We borrowed a trailer for years until we could afford a new one recently and I know it sounds daft but I’m constantly checking it’s still in the yard. The theft of the last one still haunts me.”