|
Notts police target internet auction sites
(Nottingham Evening Post Via Thomson Dialog NewsEdge) An ornate wine jug stolen from a north Notts church in 1965 has turned up for sale on eBay.
Leaders at St John the Baptist Church in Treswell, near Retford, had given up ever seeing the item again.
But Christine Davies, clerk to Treswell Parish Council, said she received a call out of the blue in February this year from someone who had seen the silver-mounted wine jug on the internet auction site.
She said: "He was a member of a church in the south of England and had been searching the site in the hope of spotting items that had been stolen from his own church.
"He said the wine jug was inscribed with the word 'Treswell' and contacted me. When parish records were searched and reports appeared of the theft, we got very excited." Mrs Davies contacted church warden Mary Beardshaw who informed the Diocese of Southwell and Nottingham who, in turn, contacted Notts police.
Ross Davis, a Notts police business crime intelligence analyst, said: "We contacted eBay and got them to stop the sale.
"By then it had attracted bids of more than GBP500. We then asked for the account details of the seller and found out he was a man from London who had come across it two years previously at an auction.
"He had no idea it was stolen and was happy to hand it back. He didn't have much choice really as he was in possession of stolen property." The wine jug had been presented to St John the Baptist Church in 1954 in memory of a local resident. It was used for communions.
It was returned to the church in March this year and remains safely under lock and key.
Solving the case of the missing jug was a major factor in the creation of a new Notts policing team dealing with internet auction site crime.
Sergeant Richard Stones, who heads up the six-strong team, said: "It made us think how much other stolen property is out there.
"There are lots of internet auction sites and lots of opportunity for criminals to try and sell on stolen and counterfeit goods.
"They use sites such as eBay, eAuction, eTrader and eBuyer. We now have a team, which will increase to eight from April 2008, who are trawling auction websites." The Notts police internet auction site crime team are only the third of their kind in the country, following the success of similar teams in the Metropolitan Police in London and the West Midlands.
Mr Stones said: "There may have been GBP200,000 of property stolen from a lorry or trailer.
"There is a strong chance the offenders would find it too risky to try and sell on the items at markets, so they will look to auction sites.
Glynn Gilfoyle from Notts County Council said: "This is a 21st Century crime and the more people that use the internet, the more we have to monitor these auction sites.
"John Clarke, chairman of Notts Police Authority, deserves a lot of credit for the creation of the team." Anyone wanting to report stolen goods turning up on an auction site should contact Notts police on 0115 967 0999.
guy.woodford@nottinghameveningpost.co.uk
Copyright 2007 Northcliffe Newspapers Group Ltd, Source: The Financial Times Limited
[ Back To TMCnet.com's Homepage ]
|
TMCnet LOGIN
Webinars
