Malcolm PriorRural affairs producer
William Maughan
William Maughan’s farm was one of four broken into in one night by a balaclava-clad gang of thieves
Early this summer a gang dressed in black and wearing balaclavas approached an isolated farmhouse in County Durham as a couple in their 80s slept inside.
They’d been staking out the property and knew exactly what to steal from the vehicles parked outside – a combine harvester’s expensive GPS equipment that could be smuggled abroad.
The farming family had fallen victim to what police say is increasingly brazen organised crime.
The National Police Chiefs’ Council (NPCC) said on Tuesday it was launching a new three-year crackdown that would help target the 20-plus gangs said to be currently operating across the countryside.
The government said the new policing strategy would be a “vital step” in tackling rural crime.
The NPCC said this year alone more than 155 arrests linked to rural organised crime gangs had been made, with nearly £13m worth of stolen farm equipment seized, some of which had been recovered from abroad, mostly from Eastern Europe.
The National Farmers’ Union (NFU) said that criminal gangs had been targeting farmers’ machinery, livestock and land for “too long” and there needed to be more help from specialist rural police officers.
One of the farms targeted belonged to William Maughan, a beef, poultry and arable farmer in County Durham whose parents live on the premises.
He said his was one of four farms in the local parish that were broken into on the same night.
Mr Maughan, a father of two, said the gang cut out GPS systems from vehicles on the farms, inc
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