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LOCALS IN CO Donegal are being told to be on the lookout for scam artists posing as ESB technicians.
A spate of incidents have been reported in recent times in which a man in a yellow ESB jacket and driving a yellow van emblazoned with the ESB logo has sought to gain entry to people’s homes across the county.
The pretext for his visit is usually to read a meter or to examine a fuse box.
The most recent incident has been reported in the Castlefin area near Lifford.
“I was canvassing next door to where the latest instance happened,” Fianna Fáil councillor Patrick McGowan told TheJournal.ie.
So yes, I can confirm that it is happening.
The woman in question didn’t let the man in, but she doesn’t want anyone to enter her house now, she is obviously worried.
McGowan confirmed with the ESB at the time that they had no such meter readers operating in the Castlefin area.
“It was very, very real, and confirmed. They had no-one in that area. We need to deal with this now because the next thing we know they’ll have moved to Galway or Mayo or somewhere else,” he said.
Gardaí were informed of the incident at the time but “they didn’t come out til the next day” according to McGowan.
“I was involved with setting up the text alert in the Finn valley area,” the councillor says.
We have a lack of garda resources here – there’s only one or two gardaí in Letterkenny who can deal with this.
People around here tend to be in touch with each other and to perform their own security.
McGowan says he has “no idea” who the perpetrators are, but the suspicion is that the men involved are casing houses with a view to future burglaries – by asking residents about when they are available for repairs or upgrades.
“There’s been a lot of sightings of ESB vans about the place now but they have all turned out to be legitimate when confronted,” he says.
When contacted by TheJournal.ie gardaí confirmed that they have no record of the incidents in question.
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Take me to Court….
Did you come up with that one yourself or just plagiarise Chilli Gonzales’ joke? You are soooo sued… :-)
Classy by Hozier!
Just proves that two reasonably intelligent men can offend one another and not be goaded into running to their lawyers, and these days that becomes a news story. Happens every day in my office. Still, well handled by both, full marks lads.
Now why can’t we just do something similar in Syria.. ?
Not a note in his head that lad
100% publicity on Chillys behalf
Is it really necessary to two versions of the same quote?
can’t have short articles now, can we?
Just listened to Feist’s ‘how come you never go there’ and while the tempo is vaguely similar in a few places it’s nothing like Hozier’s ‘take me to church’. I suppose the two song titles. ‘take me to church & how come you never go there’ are fittingly comparable though.
How could he sue over a mere suggestion the songs sound similar?
Because Chilly Gonzales accused Hozier of plagiarism after he claimed that his hit ‘Take Me to Church’ was essentially a rip-off of Feist’s ‘How Come You Never Go There?’ and he didn’t mince his words and it wasn’t a mere suggestion.
If Hozier let it go, then people would think it was true and perhaps Feist would sue Hozier for plagiarism.
There’s a lot of suing going on at the moment in the music industry over songs that sound similar and it’s costing a lot of money to the losers.
We want Chilly Willy
Fair play to hozier. But am I the only one who’s not fond of his music?
No he’s great. Prob the new Bono. Or Bob Geldof
Chilly Gonzalez is awesome. Love his stuff. Hosier is from Bray or something.
You’re in sooooooooo much trouble Del…..bend your knee before the image of His Hoziness!
The Church should sue him for bringing their good name into disrepute.
I really couldn’t give a f**k
I fukkkkking salute your direct approach sir.
… btw Chilly Gonzales real name is Jason!
Shouldn’t Hozier and Caroline Downey be more worried about Feist suing them or is this a case of attack being the best defence?
Silly Chilly jelly.
I was worried there that I was going to have to unlisten to the song a million times* *joke it’s a nice song
Pure publicity on Chilly’s behalf. And it worked.
Why did he apologise. It’s clear that Hozier was massively influenced by the song, essentially riffing his own version of it.
my bro played me the feist version not knowing about this controversy. he asked did i know the song and i was like thats take me church…different words tho!!! totally influenced by it and anyone who thinks otherwise has their head buried in the sand. still love the hozier aong tho
Personally I cant stand his music…..don’t know who would want to copy it, but on the other hand I applaud his success!
David Gray’s White Ladder is still number 22 in the charts.
Only so many songs can be sung with two lips, two lungs and one tongue.
Deep. Also completley wrong.
There are only so many books that can be written with 26 letters and a few punctuation marks.
Yeah, but your one doesn’t rhyme.
There wasn’t a massive earthquake in Japan today……….
Pay off
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