A MIDNIGHT vandal in Lisnaskea who deliberately damaged flower pots outside a bakery in the town found himself making a personal apology to staff at the business, thanks to the power of social media.

The culprit, who hadn’t banked on the tenacity of Cherry Tree Bakery’s Ashley Charles, was identified by almost 100 followers on the bakery’s Facebook page after Mr. Charles posted CCTV footage of the criminal damage in action last week.

“I wasn’t looking for prosecutions or for anyone to be publicly named and shamed,” Mr. Charles told the Impartial Reporter, “I just want people to know that what they do at night has repercussions the next day.

“I was so annoyed that my staff had to go and clean up after some inconsiderate person who was out for the night and decided to do a bit of wrecking.

“We put those flower baskets out in June and we bring them in every Friday and Saturday night but they are left out every other night of the week. So many people had commented on how lovely they looked and how they brightened the place up. So when this happened, I was just angry and I thought, with the power of social media, someone would be bound to know who was responsible.”

Determined to track down the offender, Mr. Charles took to Facebook, asking his followers to send him a private message if they could identify who was responsible. To date his original post has attracted over 36,000 views, as well as around 100 private messages.

“I was overwhelmed by the response from people,” Mr. Charles conceded, “And it wasn’t just the people we would expect to message you -- younger people as well taking were taking an interest in their town too. I think it’s important for everyone to take a bit of pride in their own town.”

Armed with his CCTV footage and the information gleaned from Facebook followers, Mr. Charles contacted the police. “I said I didn’t really want it taken any further,” he explained, “I just wanted someone to take responsibility for it. So the police agreed that if he came down and apologised to us personally, they would take it no further. So he was brought down here and I made him apologise to my staff.

“He said he was sorry and that it wouldn’t happen again. I felt that was fair and that it was a good outcome in the end,” said Mr. Charles.

“I just wanted to highlight a wee problem and hopefully next time people will think twice about making a mess in the town.”

The PSNI said: “Police are investigating a report of criminal damage in the Main Street area of Lisnaskea on Tuesday, October 25. It was reported that sometime around midnight a number of flower pots that were outside a local bakery had been knocked over and damaged. One person has been spoken to and enquiries are continuing.”