More crime in Turnditch Orchard

At the weekend when I visited the orchard to pick up some sawdust left over from the tree felling work I noticed that someone had cut the main gate chain. They'd used bolt cutters to cut through the chain, I found the evidence in the cut links on the ground. There are clear cut marks on the link. Whoever did this tried to hide the effects of their criminal damage by attempting to knot the chain around the gate frame.

A link cut from the gate chain on Turnditch Orchard

I don't know the motive behind this latest attack, but it is getting damned annoying. Those people/organisations who are allowed vehicle access have been given a key, at our expense, to the gate padlock. We'd allowed enough looseness in the chain to allow dog walkers access for their dogs to the public footpath. In common law we only are required to allow access to humans along the foot path and the old stile remains open. A contact phone number is posted on the gate to allow people to call us if they need access.

It is time for us to get a bit tougher on the security of the site. Few people know I used to help design physical security for premises located in Africa and the Middle East. Soon people will be finding access security to the orchard much more difficult to compromise.

Edit: 8th June 2016: I spoke too soon. We've had another attack before I had chance to introduce the new security measures.

Crime in sleepy Turnditch

Crime visits the sleepy village of Turnditch, or rather the orchard site we're developing. We'd installed an electric fence between our site and the adjoining farmer's field The purpose was to stop sheep coming into the orchard and destroying the young fruit trees. This electric fence also had the side benefit in that stopped the farmer's sheep wandering on to the Ecclesbourne Valley railway. Those sheep are not our responsibility, but it cost nothing to have extended the protection, so it was a courtesy.

This evening we visited the site to charge the battery which powers the fence. When we arrived we found that someone has stolen the fence energiser unit. We'd hidden this unit out of sight under a builder's bucket, but anyone following the fence line would be able to find it. It was positioned in such a way that a deliberate premeditated activity is needed to locate the unit. 

It is a red coloured Hotshock A15 energiser worth £137. and was equipped with an iron stand post.

Ironically the thief left the lead acid battery in place. It was worth more than the energiser, but weighing in at 20 Kgs was less attractive. This crime will be reported to the police so will be included in the official figures for the locality.

There was also damage to the street side stock fence where someone has cut through the wire stock fence to gain access to the orchard. It is quite a distance from where the energiser was located, but this criminal damage is probably related to the theft. This will be reported as a crime. The combination of the two activities means it is possible for the sheep to gain access to the road. 

Hole cut in roadside stock fence

By the way, the unit is forensically marked. Should anyone be daft enough to buy it they'll find out the hard way such things are traceable.