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Milk lorry drivers from Dairygold, Tipperary Co-op and Kerry Group will be part of new text alert system being piloted in Co Limerick from January.
The text alert would work similarly to the current neighbourhood watch system where drivers will contact Bruff garda station if they see anything suspicious in rural communities.
Gardaí will then send out an alert to their patrols and a text to other milk lorry drivers to make them aware of any suspicious activity in an area.
The initiative is the brainchild of local Bruff Garda David Hennessy after an incident in March 2017.
“I was on patrol one night when a milk lorry driver who was working rang at 3am to say that he had driven past a quad being rolled down a road by a group of men,” Hennessy explained.
“The culprits had got into difficulty about 10 miles from the farm they’d stolen it from. We recovered the quad and returned it to that farmer when he reported it missing.”
Figures from the Bruff area show that the risk of burglary is over 15% higher after 8pm, with crime levels increasing during the months of October through to April.
Garda analysis shows that thefts and burglaries increased by 100% for the first three months of 2018 compared with the same period in 2017.
The pilot programme has been welcomed and supported by Limerick IFA chair Shay Galvin.
“Anything that will help to tackle rural crime is excellent,” Galvin said.
“Hopefully criminals will be deterred when they realise that just a truck passing could link them to a crime in rural areas.”
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