Rural crime: two-thirds of farmers are victims of crime

Two-thirds of Irish farmers have been the victims of agricultural crime, the first ever farming-focused crime survey has revealed.

A survey of 861 farmers, carried out by the ICSA and Waterford Institute of Technology, found that 556 farming families had experienced crime ranging from theft of property to trespass, arson and criminal assault on their farms.

Vandalism, criminal damage and trespass accounted for 47% of the 1,512 crimes reported, while theft accounted for 43%. Criminal assault and fraud accounted for 5% each.

The survey, the first of its kind in Ireland, found that 41% of farmers were the victim of more than one crime.

Unauthorised hunting, fishing or shooting was the most common offence reported under trespass, followed closely by rubbish dumping and unauthorised use of farmland.

In the theft category, 46% of the farmers surveyed had property stolen more than once and 16% reported three or more thefts. The most common item stolen from farms was agricultural diesel (22%), followed by electrical and hand tools (21%), and machinery and equipment such as livestock trailers (17%). Some 10% of those surveyed reported having livestock stolen.

Fourteen farmers reported robberies in which a person used force or threatened to use force in the course of theft. In eight of those robberies force was threatened, and force was used in six.

Some 43 farmers reported 76 incidents relating to threats of assault, physical assault and coercion. The threat of assault was five times more common than actual criminal assault.

ICSA president Patrick Kent said the survey revealed that the issue of agricultural crime is a far bigger issue than official garda statistics would suggest.

“They would also suggest that the courts have adopted a far too lenient approach to offenders, particularly to repeat offenders. The rural community believes that the judicial system provides virtually no deterrent to this type of crime,” said Kent.

ICSA rural development chair Seamus Sherlock said the results were in keeping with what he had heard from farmers anecdotally.

“The ordinary decent people of rural Ireland are outraged that criminals seem to be acting with impunity,” said Sherlock. “Rural communities feel under siege due to lack of garda resources. Even where the gardaí are successful in catching criminals the perception is that they get off lightly in the courts and are given every benefit of the doubt. However, no such flexibility is shown to law-abiding citizens. At a recent meeting I was told a story about a frightened farmer who confronted intruders with his shotgun and within hours his shotgun was seized by gardaí.”

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