Northern Ireland thieves make pony getaway

Thieves who unsuccessfully tried to hot-wire a tractor in County Donegal instead stole a pony and made their escape on horseback.

Joe McGlinchey discovered on Monday that one of his Connemara ponies had been taken from his smallholding at Mill Brae outside Stranorlar.

He later discovered an attempt had been made to steal his tractor.



"Thankfully the pony's OK ... it was no good as a getaway vehicle," said Mr McGlinchey. The pony, called Snowy, was found in a field outside Ballybofey.

"I went up to investigate and it was my pony alright," said Mr McGlinchey. Later on that evening, someone came into the yard and said they saw the pony being ridden up the road with two fellas on its back. We were all in the yard thinking it was very strange, and wondering why the tractor wasn't stolen.

"We then looked at the tractor and found the tractor was vandalised. They had tried to hot-wire it and pulled the whole dash out of it and broke the dash," he said. "They then turned to the pony - it was very unusual."