A shop owner has praised the actions of a young passerby who was caught cleaning up the mess made by vandals outside his store.

After reviewing CCTV footage to find out who the culprits behind the vandalism were, the team at Kearney Interiors in Ardee, Co Louth came across a "wonderful man cleaning it up".

"It's a pretty good news story I have to say. It happened on early Sunday morning but I wasn't back into the shop until Tuesday when I noticed what had happened," owner Thomas Kearney told independent.ie.

"You couldn't make it up. You can see the man running and then stopping once he seen the mess and he starts cleaning it all up. It's absolutely fantastic. The positive moment beat the vandals' negative moment by a country mile."

After posting the clip of the young man tidying up and even re-potting flowers on the store's Facebook page, Mr Kearney said the video has gone viral.

"He's now a local hero. He's not short of being proposed to with the amount of good well messages sent on our Facebook page. Everyone loves him!

Mr Kearney said he had left a voucher in the shop for the do-gooder as a thank you gesture.

Online Editors