CRUSHED: Wisbech metal thieves’ car destroyed as police send message to Fenland criminals
A CAR seized from Wisbech metal thieves was destroyed today as police sent a message to criminals in Fenland: “commit crime and we will crush your car”.
It took just minutes to rip the engine out of the Ford Fiesta, crush it to within a quarter of its normal size and toss it onto the scrapheap at Porter’s Yard, in Oldfield Lane, Wisbech.
The car had belonged to Dee-Jay Gordon Chapman, 22, from Bath Road, Wisbech. Chapman and his accomplice James Peter Christie, 22, of Mill Road, Emneth, had used the vehicle to steal metal from the gardens of homes in Fenland.
Officers watched as the pair stole metal and vehicle parts from the grounds of a home in Garden Lane, Wisbech St Mary, in April. After a short chase - in which the offenders began throwing the property out of the car - both men were arrested.
Chapman and Christie both pleaded guilty to theft at King’s Lynn Magistrates’ Court and were ordered to carry out 40 hours of unpaid work. The court ordered that the car should be destroyed and Christie was also fined �95 for posession of cannabis.
Detective Sergeant Chris O’Brien said: “It’s about trying to get the message out - if you come to Cambridgeshire and use your vehicle to commit crime, we will crush it. The message is court, convict, crush.
“Hopefully this will make people think twice about committing crime. People often accept their sentences but if we start taking away their possessions then that acts as another deterrent.
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“These vehicles are what they use to commit crime - if they haven’t got them they will be out of pocket and hopefully the good people of Cambridgeshire won’t be inconvenienced as much.”
