‘He was like a guardian angel sent to me’

It was last December and Julie’s son was at long last moving into his own house with his two young children.

The young family didn’t have a lot of money and Julie really wanted to help them out with furnishing their home so they would be comfortable for Christmas. She estimated €2,000 would get the house kitted out nicely.

However, she didn’t have any money. So she asked around. Did anyone know anybody who could lend her money?

“I heard about this gentleman and where he lived. I went to his house and he welcomed me into his home and he was lovely. He was like a guardian angel that was sent to me,” she said.

At no point did Julie really think about what she was getting into, but equally, the man didn’t deceive her. He was quite up-front before he handed over the cash. If she took the €2,000, she’d be paying back €5,000, he said. She nodded.

All she could think of was her son’s delight when she handed over the cash. “My son and my two grandsons came into my head and I thought it will be worth it. They can get all the stuff done that they need in their house. At the time, I just wanted the money.”

Six months later and her life has become hell. Her son might have a nicely- furnished home but she has no furniture in her own house as she has had to sell her three-piece suite, a dressing table and a wardrobe to feed herself. At one point, she went for nearly a fortnight without buying food.

When he handed over the €2,000, she handed over her social welfare card — her only means of income. Now every Thursday, she has to race to her local post office for 10.30am. He is sitting outside in his car. He then rolls down his window and hands her back her card — for 10 minutes.

Julie then queues up in the post office, gets her €167 payment, wraps two €50 notes around the card and slips the card back through his car window.

This means she has just €67 a week to live on: €25 of that €67 goes on her electricity meter card and another €10 on her gas meter card. The gas sum triples and quadruples during the winter.

“It’s getting harder and harder every week. I’m finding it very difficult,” she said on RTÉ’s Liveline yesterday. To date, she’s paid off €3,100 but has another €1,900 to pay back. And there seems to be no way out of it.

She has also sold off the little bit of jewellery that she had at a cash for gold shop; nothing particularly valuable but of sentimental value.

Despite her arthritis, Julie now spends her nights watching television on a hard chair due to lack of armchairs. Often she goes to bed early, as she so desperately needs some comfort.

She is more often than not hungry now but is too terrified to tell her son or any of her friends what she has got herself into.

She is terrified at what action might be taken. She told her son she got rid of her couch as doctors had recommended she sit on a hard chair.

It’s hard enough handing over money every week when you’re hungry but it’s the way the loan shark treats her that is really sending her over the edge.

She had been waiting months for a medical test and got a date for it a few weeks ago. The test cost €100, and so she told the moneylender she would have to miss a payment.

“I will break your two fucking legs and put your windows in around you if don’t have €200 next week,” he responded.

When she dutifully appeared with the €200 the following week, he sneered “if you ever do that again, a bullet will go through your head”.

Another day, she was five minutes late and he phoned her: “Where the fuck are you, you piece of dirt? You think I have nothing better to do than to wait around for you? Get up here now fast.”

She returned home that day and “got into the shower and I scrubbed and I scrubbed and I scrubbed until my arms bled. I felt so dirty.”

Last Thursday, she walked down to a river and stood staring in. “I put my right leg forward but my left leg wouldn’t come. I’m a coward as I wouldn’t have to go through this pain today if I had done that. But I can’t do it anymore. My mind is made up. I can’t do this.”

Julie went to St Vincent de Paul and they advised her to go the gardaí but she is far too scared.

Julie hopes her story might stop somebody falling into the same trap.

“Don’t do what I did. Your life is over. You’ll end up selling everything in your home. You’ll have no home left.”

Last night, Fianna Fáil justice spokesman Dara Calleary urged the Government “to mount a nationwide campaign warning people to avoid loan sharks at all costs and advising on the support available to people with money problems. This should include resources and promoting the Mabs service.”