Longford vote counter finds wedding ring in Ballot Box

A Longford man who was a vote counter at the Count John McCormack centre discovered a surprise in his ballot box on Saturday when he found a wedding ring.

Peter Creamer discovered the unexpected expensive extra item as he was searching through the voting papers this morning in the Count John McCormack centre in Athlone, Co Westmeath.

The unlucky voter managed to mislay and lose his wedding ring when it slipped off and fell into a ballot box at Gaelscoil an Choilin in Mullingar.

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Peter shared the expensive discovery on social media in an attempt to find the owner of the lost silver band.

A note had been left with the returning officer that outlined that it was thought the ring had slipped into one of the boxes, however, it was not clear which box it was.

RTE posted a picture of Peter smiling holding the ring on their Longford-Westmeath election coverage page.

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The picture was captioned, "We have a wedding ring! One of the counters Peter Creamer has found a wedding ring in a box from Gael Scoil an Choilin in Mullingar."

The wedding ring's owner was urged to make their way to the count centre to collect the jewellery over the weekend and he was eventually reunited with it.

Meanwhile, there were 469 votes spoiled in the General Election in county Longford.

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Marking the box beside the preferred candidate with a tick or an 'x' instead of listing candidates in order of preference numerically by putting the number '1', '2', '3' and so on spoiled many votes.

The vast majority were unintentionally spoiled but others intentionally spoiled by voters on Friday with some writing 'Free Enoch Burke' scribbled on them.

It is understood other vote papers had drawings and numbers written on them in county Longford.