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A four-ton dumper truck became wedged in a Black Country canal after being stolen from a nearby building site.
Yobs in Tipton pinched the green digger from Great Bridge market and drove it along the towpath and through a canal lock, leaving it stuck just above the water, before setting it alight.
The mammoth machine smashed over a wall and has broken two lock gates along the stretch of the historic Walsall Canal, off Olympus Drive.
Workers were at the scene today and were set to try and lever the truck out using a JCB. Construction firm Stave-Con is working on a £1.2 million redevelopment scheme at Great Bridge market.
A steam roller was also stolen from the site over the weekend and blocked off Great Bridge traffic island on Saturday morning, causing traffic chaos.
Fire crews were called out yesterday evening to tackle the blazing dumper truck. Firefighters from Tipton put out the small blaze at around 6.30pm and then cordoned off the area.
Chris Scott, from Stave-Con, said they had hired out the dumper truck to carry out work on the market and had left it parked on the site over the weekend, before discovering what had happened this morning.
“It’s really annoying,” he said. “This is a lot of expense for us and it is our company that is going to have to put it right. “We’ve got to try and get a JCB to pull it out because that is the only thing that will get down the towpath.
“The locks are broken, the wall has been knocked down and there is loads of damage that we have got to sort out.”
Passer-by Patricia Hinton, 47, from nearby Eagle Lane, said: “Hundreds of years of our heritage and they’ve destroyed it just like that. It is disgusting.”
23 Comments
Simple isn’t it. Full criminal damage costs paid by the hooligans who have been shopped by decent citizens. If they are under 18 clobber the parents. If no-one has the cash or assets then take it out of earnings until it is paid. No cash paid? Put em in prison for a few years. Until this type of punishment happens the madness goes on and on and on.
Looks to me like it will be 3 hours community service. Halved when they don’t turn up.
Tough on crime, tough on the causes of crime.
No more boom and bust!
I imagine the hooligans involved in all of these events are having a good laugh at the publicity they have received. Well hooligans, laugh at this - I hope when you are caught that the magistrate/judge gives each one of you 5 years hard labour digging out canals, dirty ditches, river beds etc, in fact anything where you are up to your necks in muck and water and then every so often, the people watching over you can throw back the rubbish you have dug out and then you, the hooligans, can did it out again and again and again!
Prison is too good nowadays, it is nothing short of a rest home with games computers, colour tv’s with no bills to pay and so on. Hard labour is the only answer!
I reckon that there is no evidence to say that this is vandalism etc, it looks like modern art to me in the way the truck is positioned so that it glistens in the sun. Just because it’s not to everyone’s taste it gets called yob vandalism. What a sad world.
These people are scumbags and should learn to respect both private and public property but how did they manage to steal and drive a dumper truck and steamroller; do these pieces of machinery not require keys to start them?
kids kids kids, shame you did not knock down yourselves and break each others legs now that would be a story ,but you would receive massive compo when the pc brigade found out,great britain what a fine and upstanding country it USED to be.
HOW DARE this group of kids vandalise the canal locks! They have no respect! i hope these thugs end up in jail i find it very offensive. But, surley the vehicles should have been left somewhere locked up?
I live right there on the canal.It’s a shame -it’s always covered with rubbish and graffiti.You can’t walk along there because it’s all overgrown and always drinkers/yobs/druggies down there.3 people have been pulled out of that stretch of canal over the past couple of years-not all of them alive.Shame could be so nice…
Hey trevor, did you get an arts in the community grant from the EU for that ‘art’ then? heheheh!
Why does this sort of stuff happen? Because the people responsible know they can get away with it. Even if they are caught, the law is an ass and nothing will happen to them. I suppose the people who did this will use the classic excuse of being bored and having nothing else better to do. If they had more than one brain cell to begin with then there would be no need for these random acts of stupidity.
Wonder if the traffic wardens have stuck a ticket on there?
yet another attack on tipton. . at least there was no explosives attached to it! Maybe JCB should lock their sites up a better??
Look at the time this happened - the local police force available, or was the station closed (again)? Yobs win in straight sets, and it’s not surprising when milking crime figures or wasting money on silly PC schemes takes precedent.
Such incidents aren’t uncommon; you can almost set your watch by them. Arson, vandalism, verbal and physical assault..is it really any surprise people are leaving? Why people no longer trust the police? Situations like this are going to end up with someone killed. Note the time of the incident and the fact that a police station was just up the road. Was that station open? You be the judge..
Yet again, a disgraceful portrayal of the sheer STATE this area, and the incompetent measures in place to deal with such problems.
These crimes occur because both the culprits and the people responsible for administering law know they can get away with it. The rest of us are treated very differently - accidentally discarding your cigarette in Great Bridge will result in a fine, in excess of £75 or more. I’ve seen these operatives pounce, like smiling Cheshire cats waiting for an extra topping of cream ,despite the fact that a shockingly low proportion of fly-tippers have been prosecuted.
Such incidents are shocking, but not surprising here given the state of play as regards local law enforcement policy..the double standards; the beaurocracy; the milked crime figures; the ‘non-emergency’ police telephone lines; the police stations that don’t seem to be serving the needs of the local community when they are needed most - meanwhile the rest of us can’t step one FOOT out of line without being treated like dirt. It is as though by design. I would be absolutely ashamed to bring anyone to this town and the surrounding areas.
I think it is highly irresponsible of the company who had the digger stolen. I see no padding to prevent the young persons from hurting themselves on the digger blage. I also think that the canal should have been drained in case one of the little darlings fell in and whoever left those matchs lying around needs re-education too. When these youths are eventually caught they have been traumatised enough as it is, they should be sent to the carribean for a few months to recover. Unlike those violent young people who are overseas serving their country in such a vicious manner.
I also think that the moon is made of cheese, the world IS flat and yobs are just bored saints . Kneecap them.
This is the same kind of mind-set that continues to attack a Christmas parade around the streets of Tipton, the same mindset that goes on a daily wrecking spree, making the lives of local people an absolute living hell. I think the problem is that the solutions proposed don’t actually tackle the problem, and in effect end up creating an even bigger on. Law-abiding citizens should not have to tolerate this kind of behaviour, but they do because the power structure is such that they are effectively powerless to do anything about it.
Here’s part the problem:
Tipton Police Station, Lower Church Lane
Monday-Friday: 10.00-18.00
0845 113 5000
http://www.west-midlands.police.uk/sandwell/
Non-existent policing, and central telephone numbers that merely divert you to another station MILES away. This is a dispicable form of law and order and it is simply unnaceptable. You’re paying for local ’services’ and you are not getting them.
So when you routinely see (like some friends have this evening), vandalism, abuse, harassment at the hands of the scum of the earth..when you see the crime figures for this area, you will know why - and this has gone on for years, both before and after the shiny new police station was built. FAT lot of use that is. If crime in this area is not properly addressed then you will see vigilante groups who will do it for themselves. It’s simply a matter of time.
Ref post #19.
look up ‘Motor firm factory hit by arsonists’ (Tipton, 23.10.08).
Quote “Round here, though, it’s just normal and the police can’t do anything.”
Wrong. There’s a cop-shop just down the road. Such anti-social behaviour is routine..a cop-shop is needed, in order to act as both a deterrent and rapid response initiative. It isn’t - you get non-emergency numbers and police coming from West Brom. And it’s been like this years. You wonder why Tipton is a deadbeat down, well..deadbeat policies don’t help it.
Anyone know who would a thing like that?
22. The type of people who have small brains. Last night I see them smash bottles behind police station but why bother rining police when their station is not open? I am living here only short time but already I see lots of problems like gangs especially in owen street and near chip shots, it is worse than american slum. I cannot wait to move away from here.