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| The Metal Bandits |
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Page 1 of 5 Although soaring metal prices could mean that Cornish mines may become profitable once more there is a drawback. Lindsey Kennedy investigates how Cornwall’s places of worship are being targeted by criminals. Here’s a conundrum. What could link the booming economies in places like India and China to criminal attacks on schools and churches in Cornwall? The answer is metal, scrap metal to be exact. There’s been a remarkable surge in the value of metal like copper, lead and iron, driven in part by the insatiable appetite for raw materials in the developing world. Sadly, those higher prices have attracted the criminal fraternity – and they have no scruples about where they look for scrap. In fact metal crime is presently the fastest growing crime in the UK. Across Cornwall warehouses, stockyards and industrial estates have all been raided. Local authorities have reported the theft of aluminium road signs, cast iron manhole covers and copper wiring and pipes in new housing developments. There have been cases of ‘metal bandits’ targeting gardens of remembrance - ripping out brass plaques put up by loved ones. It’s the roof lead from schools and churches that have been hardest hit in the Duchy - but even electricity substations have been stripped of copper, despite the obvious hazards.  Mawnan Parish Church, built in 1231, where the congregation had to rally around before service to clean up water leaking from the uncovered roof. Picture by Sam Batchelor. Upton Cross Primary School, near Liskeard, had lead stripped from its roof earlier this year. The head teacher, Mark Clutsom, said they had no idea they'd been hit - until it rained. He said: “It started pouring and rain was coming through the roof in several places. I was in the middle of teaching and at first thought it was one little leak, but there were more and more leaks and it clearly wasn’t a maintenance problem as I’d first thought. “The police said there had been something of a metal crime spree that weekend so obviously someone had been going round with a van and taking metal.” He said it was hard to protect buildings like village schools as legitimate workmen or teachers were often around at weekends, so a visiting van may not have caused suspicions in the village. |
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