Digger stolen from Dorset found 1,200 miles away in rural Poland

A digger stolen from a development site in Dorset has been found five months later and 1,200 miles away in a rural town in south-eastern Poland.

Dorset police received a report on 1 April that a Hitachi digger and a JCB digger had been stolen in the small town of Ferndown, near Bournemouth.

The Hitachi digger was successfully tracked down to the Pruchnik area of Poland last month, Dorset police said. Arrangements have been made for it to be taken back to the UK and returned to its owner.

Pruchnik is a rural town of fewer than 4,000 people about 20 miles from the Ukrainian border. If the digger was transported by land it is likely to have passed through France, Belgium, the Netherlands and Germany before arriving in Poland.

The owner of the vehicle said: “As a developer, we have been hit hard over the past year by theft. We are very pleased to have had this machine recovered. It is a testament to the work carried out by the police and hopefully serves as a reminder of the relentless work involved. Even across country borders, stolen items can and will be tracked down.”

The discovery was made with the help of numerous agencies including the National Construction and Agricultural Theft team, the National Vehicle Crime Intelligence Service, Polish police and Interpol.

PC Kate Schofield of the Dorset police rural crime team, said: “This type of crime has a significant impact on victims and their businesses and we are determined to do all we can to recover stolen items and reduce the impact on victim’s livelihoods.

“Our investigation is ongoing to identify the offenders and hold them accountable for their organised offending. We are also doing all we can to locate the second digger that was stolen during this incident.”

Supt Andrew Huddleston of the National Rural Crime Unit said the theft demonstrated that international organised crime was targeting the UK farming and construction industries. He said: “This is one of many international machinery seizures made over the last 18 months.”