Irish Examiner View: Cattle-rustling incidents a sign of the times

What is a shock is the fact that the perpetrators seem to feel their task in an easy one.

Cattle have been taken in incidents in West Cork, North Kerry, Laois, and Kilkenny in recent weeks. File Picture.

The recent spate of cattle-rustling in West Cork and Kerry is, in some ways a throwback to times when such crimes were easily committed and rarely punished. In other ways it is a deeply depressing indication of the times in which we live.

It has been suggested, despite rigorous tagging and testing, that the animals being rustled are being stolen to order, butchered and sold into a growing black market.