Thieves steal festive lights from garden

Denise Barnes, of West Way, watched CCTV footage of the two criminals unplug and make off with her decorative reindeer and polar bear.

Mrs Barnes said her children - aged seven and nine - were ‘so upset’, after learning the lights had been taken just after 10pm on Saturday December 10.

“Me and my husband had gone out for the evening and we had a babysitter looking after the kids,” she said. When we got home the sitter said she had heard some commotion outside - we had a look and realised our lights had gone.

“But we saw the two men on CCTV. They came round and checked it all out, first unwrapping the wires and then unplugging it all before carrying it off.

“It’s quite sad really - I can’t believe someone could do something like that.

“The children are so excited about Christmas but were so upset when this happened and said ‘Why would someone do that mummy?’.”

She describes one of the men as bald on top with hair around the sides, between 50 to 60 years of age, wearing beige chino trousers.

Mrs Barnes said he was ordering a younger person what to do as they carried out the crime.

“It’s hard to tell if the younger person was a girl or a boy,” she said, “but about 16-years-old, very slim and wearing a hoody.”

Mr and Mrs Barnes took to the streets of Slinfold in a bid to recover the mechanical animals - valued at more than £100 - that ‘may had been dumped somewhere by people coming back from the pub drunk and taking them for a laugh’.

She added: “Everyone was saying how lovely the decorations were.

“It’s really upsetting because they’ve gone onto our premises and have obviously planned this.”

PC Jon Walker, of Horsham police, said: “This appears to be a one-off incident and we are currently investigating it.”

Anyone with information regarding the incident can contact the police on 101.