Gardaí hunt ‘hefty blonde lady’ after robbery of gas cylinders from shop

GARDAÍ in Co Limerick are looking for a suspected thief they officially describe as “a hefty blonde lady”.

The tall female in her 20s displayed Herculean strength in what has been described as a brazen robbery.

She pulled up outside Moss the Farmer’s Spar shop on the Killarney road in Abbeyfeale at 5.50pm when the store was busy.

In front of staff and customers, she then proceeded to lift four heavy bottles of gas and pitch them onto the roof rack on her car. Without paying, she drove off and hasn’t been seen since.

Shop owner James Harnett said: “She drove up right in front of the shop in front of the CCTV cameras. The cameras showed she had driven past a few minutes earlier and drove up a cul-de-sac before returning.

“She parked about 20ft from where the bottled gas was and then lifted them up no bother.

“She was gone so quickly that she had left before we realised she hadn’t paid for the gas. The cylinders cost over €30 each and the fill of gas about €30, so the total loss is about €240.”

After viewing CCTV which caught the woman in action, gardaí posted a “wanted person” alert on the Pulse system looking for a suspect officially described as “a hefty blonde lady”.

However, when Garda John Finnerty put out the weekly garda appeal on Limerick Life 95FM yesterday, he just referred to a “blonde woman”, and left out the “hefty” description placed on the garda Pulse system.

He would not comment on the contents of any Pulse message.

“She lifted the four drums onto the roof rack and then drove off without paying. It would have taken a considerable amount of effort and she must be a fairly strong person. She was there just a few minutes before driving off.”

She was alone in the green car she used to ferry the gas cylinders from the scene.

Mr Harnett said they have taken further security precautions following the visit of the woman.

“We have all the bottles chained now,” he said.

CCTV from the shop security system is currently being analysed by the gardaí and the security company which installed it.

Mr Harnett said: “It is an old system which has got a certain number of frames per minute. If we can get a number of the car, there should be no problem finding out who she is.”

Meanwhile, the garda hunt for the mystery “hefty blonde lady” continues.