Anger as second community defibrillator stolen
A parish council has made an appeal for help after the second theft of a public defibrillator.
Upper Arley Parish Council has put out the appeal to anyone in the community who saw the theft of the defibrillator from outside the Bellmans Cross Inn in Shatterford, near Bewdley.
The lock on the DefibSafe cabinet, which is located inside a red telephone box outside the pub, was found to have been forced open on Monday, November 16.
It is the second time the cabinet has been broken into and a defibrillator stolen, with Angela Preece, parish clerk with Upper Arley Parish Council, expressing her own disappointment about the theft.
She said: “I feel very angry and I think it’s really shocking that people can sink so low to steal a defibrillator, not once, but twice.
“It’s also really worrying as if someone has a heart attack or something similar, there’s no defibrillator there to help them.”
Life
Mrs Preece said the previous defibrillator had been stolen in July in a similar way, with the parish council replacing it at a cost of £1,170.
She also confirmed it was one of two public access defibrillators available for use, with the other being stored in a telephone kiosk in the village centre.
She said: “I suppose, in the future, we’ll have to look at putting this in a much more suitable location to avoid this happening again.
“What I would say to those people who stole the defibrillator is think about what would you do if you or a member of your family needed this type of equipment and it was stolen?
“If it’s been stolen and is now available, then you might end up costing someone their life.”
West Mercia Police is appealing for witnesses to the theft and has asked for anyone with any information about the stolen defibrillator to contact them on 101 quoting the crime reference number SD-40115-20-2222-00
