Rugeley school ransacked days after summer holidays begin

Yobs caused extensive damage to The Hart School in Rugeley.

They broke through gates before ripping off doors, breaking windows and smashing ceiling lights at the Upper School site of the school in Burnthill Lane.

Within minutes of the incident, the on-site security team reported that three intruders were vandalising the building.

Headteacher Chris Keen says he is ‘very confident’ that the culprits will be swiftly brought to justice as there is CCTV footage capturing those who carried out the raid, which took place on July 29.

Mr Keen said: “We take any incident of trespassing and criminal damage very seriously.

“As a direct result of the swift action taken by our on-site security team and the school, police officers and sniffer dogs arrived within minutes.

“They were able to uncover substantial evidence in addition to the clear, high-quality images which our extensive CCTV system captured of the offenders.

“We are therefore very confident the criminals responsible will be caught swiftly and will be prosecuted.

“We hope this will serve as a deterrent to others that we will not tolerate anti-social behaviour or criminal damage and we will support police to pursue a prosecution.”

The Upper School site is now closed permanently to pupils as The Hart School is uniting all its pupils and resources onto its Lower School site in Penkridge Bank Road from September. The move will allow for a raft of improvements to be made by the school which has 1,200 pupils.

Councillor Alan Dudson, of the Brereton and Ravenhill ward, said: “It’s obviously the youth of today don’t seem to have any worries about breaking in.

"There’s very little police cover around – you hardly see any walking about.

“I hope that the pictures of the CCTV are good enough to identify them and that they’re treated accordingly.”