What an odd story. He thought the story the ‘trainer’ was telling him was odd, but never offered to take the horse home - but decided to look out for the pony in case it turned up at a sale?? ????
Irish law may well be different to uk law, but I believe under uk law the owner would still be the breeder and the current “owners” would have to return him as the trainer cannot sell what is not his to sell. It would be then up to his current “owners” to recover the loss from the trainer.
They could negotiate with the breeder to retain him for payment of a fee and then attempt to recover this from the trainer or they could return him and attempt to recover the original price plus any costs relating to his keep from the trainer.
It very much is buyer beware.
Didn,t it say stolen in 2018? If it was a 3/4 year old being broken then would not be at all old now. I would say if it is doing well it could be worth considerably more by now. Who knows if the owner had kept him he could be worth easily 7 or 8 thousand now?Thing is its 10 years since the so called theft occured meaning the horse is now old and the owners probably are very fond of him no way will it be worth another 7,500 fo him