Tracker helps officers arrest Formby man for drug supply and theft offences

We have arrested a man on suspicion of theft and drug supply offences following the theft of a high-value tent box from a vehicle in Birkdale.

Yesterday, Thursday 14 November, we received a report that a tent box had been stolen overnight from outside an address in Birkdale.

The owner of the vehicle had fitted a tracker, which was used to locate the tent box, which had been fitted to a Land Rover in the Formby area. A man was detained at a nearby address and the Land Rover was forensically recovered. Also recovered at the address were around 100 suspected ecstasy tablets (below). 

A 35-year-old man from Formby has been arrested on suspicion of Theft from a motor vehicle; and Possession with intent to supply Class A drugs. He has been taken to a police station for questioning and remains in custody.

Chief Inspector Rob Budden said: "This was an excellent use of technology from the vehicle owner, who was able to follow the tent box from thousands of miles away and allow us to take swift action to make an arrest. We will now be investigating the man arrested for this and drugs offences. 

“Using a tracker on valuable items should act as a powerful deterrent to those opportunistic criminals who regard theft as easy pickings, and who wrongly think they will evade detection. We will do all we can to investigate such offences and target offenders, whose actions cause stress, inconvenience and financial burden to victims.

“We'd encourage anyone with the means to do so to consider trackers and other security measures to give you increased peace of mind, and make Merseyside a difficult place for would-be thieves to operate. 

“Crime prevention advice is also available on our force website: Preventing car and vehicle theft | Crime Prevention | Merseyside Police

Anyone with information on theft of or from vehicles should contact Merseyside Police social media desk via X @MerPolCC or Facebook ‘Merseyside Police Contact Centre’. 

You can also call 101 quoting incident reference 24000967400 or contact the independent charity Crimestoppers anonymously on 0800 555 111, or via their website here: https://crimestoppers-uk.org/give-information/forms/give-information-anonymously. Always call 999 if a crime is in progress.