Irish Debt Collection Brawl May Claim Human Leg

This is a Cute Grey Bunny. Photo by cyclequark

Can’t we all just get along?  While certainties in life outside of death, taxes, and the fact that hand-claps make any song instantly better are sometimes hard to come by, I know this much is true: debt collection and iron bars, jeeps, European bank holidays, and knives do not mix.

According to a story in the Hearld.ie, a man and his son arrived at the Ballyfermot home of a “minor criminal” last weekend to collect a €200 receivable.  When they arrived and spotted the debtor, the younger of the dynamic debt collection duo sprung from his daddy’s jeep, iron bar in hand, and approached the target of his recovery efforts.  Unbeknownst to his assailant, the debtor had a knife.

What happened next is predictable (only up to a point).  While I imagine the fracas began in a manner similar to the epic gang fight in Michael Jackson’s Beat It music video, with a series of menacing stares, electrifying choreography, and Eddie Van Halen wailing on his guitar in the distance, what we know from the Herald story is this: a tussle ensued.  Presumably the iron bar landed a few whacks.  The knife did its stab, stab, stab work as knives are wont to do.  And then, like the culmination of a violent Ring Around the Rosy, both men fell to the ground.

Knife Fights: so deadly, so beautiful. Photo by chefranden.

As I write this, Jason Statham’s agent is on the phone with Michael Bay leaving a voicemail that makes one hell of a case for casting his client in the movie version of this story.  Meanwhile, Michael Bay is on the phone with Ireland, optioning those very film rights while furiously texting a fireworks factory in Tennessee, putting it on notice to ramp up production because “we’re gonna need some big-time ‘splosions!”  But I digress.

Honor thy father.  Or at least remember that there’s a debt collection dad in a jeep in this story too, and like Chekhov’s Gun, he’s about to go off.  Sadly, amid the chaos, dad kinda blew it.  Instead of driving away to get help (or at least scooping up his son and fleeing the scene), he ran over his son.  And his femur.  And his pelvis.  And now the lad may lose his leg.  Two of the three men connected to the incident will face criminal charges, according to the Herald. (That’s right: your guess is as good as mine.)

To my knowledge, Ireland does not have an O’Fair Debt Collection Practices Act.  If it did, one can only imagine how the complaint about this debt collector would read.

Michael Klozotsky is the managing editor of insideARM.com.  One of his favorite places in Ireland is Howth, just a wee bit north of Dublin via the DART.