DetectingWales.com

Friday 13th March

Five men were arrested after they were spotted going onto private land in Suffolk with metal detectors.

A Suffolk Police spokeswoman said the men were being held on suspicion of going equipped for stealing.

She said police received a report of a group being seen on private land at Rendlesham late on Thursday.

The police helicopter and a dog unit were called in and the men were arrested. They were being held at Ipswich police station.

Four of the men were from Essex and one was from Suffolk, the spokeswoman said.

(I just found a bit more)

Officers detained the men on Thursday evening at Rendlesham, near Woodbridge, arresting them on suspicion of going equipped for stealing.

The force helicopter helped direct ground officers to where the men were located. Four men from Essex, two aged 22 and two aged 39, plus a 54-year-old man from Suffolk continue to be questioned.




http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/suffolk/7942606.stm (http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/suffolk/7942606.stm)

We could all do without this sort of thing. Sends out the wrong message and puts all detectorists in a bad light even though the vast majority of us abide by the rules.

Bet they were all dressed like the S.A.S. in their camo.  ;D ;D

They were caught at night and had travelled a long distance. I don't think it was a rally! The sooner this type of thing is clamped down on the sooner the law abiding members of our hobby will get some recognition. The press have seized upon this and detectorists should realise the hobby needs this like a hole in the head.

tee hee,  it wasn't me Max,   honestly  lol

I Know Nighthawking is a really bad thing but lets get the crime into prespective
its up there with speeding and going the wrong way down a one way street im my view

You only got to read your local paper to see who the real criminals are ...thugs and muggers there isnt a week that go,s by that some pensioner isnt attacked.

The Police are good at protecting fields but then it comes to protecting decent law abiding people you got to fend for yourself
Ive got a 13 stone angry Rottwieller to look after me so i can sleep safely in my bed !

Well done the great british police !

Whoever it was they deserve getting thier collar felt.

Personally I am very against any kind of unauthorised pillaging of ancient sites. These people hadn't driven hundreds of miles to pick on a random field.

I tend to agree with Phil (and so does my brother who is a police sergeant) at the moment it's rated as badly as being a drug dealer with the possible fines etc;
No they shouldn't be going on sites that are out of bounds, but as others have stated it's hard enough to find it in the daylight.
Would like to know more of the story before making a sound judgement.  :-\

Some years ago now i was away on a ralley,  got talking to a couple of guys,  they said they go nighthawking,  they do the research,  find the farms and fields and go and ask permision off the famer,  if he turns then down they go back in the night,
 he said they have made thousands from it,  lots of gold and silver too.
they looked a rough lot too,
 a discrace and a let down to all the rest of us law abiding detectorists, giving us all a bad name,
selfishness and greed greed greed,
Alan

with respect to you phil but i cant differentiate between "who the real criminals ....thugs and muggers" are and nighthawkers. nighthawkers by deffinition detect on land they have no permission to (tresspass). and take what ever they find , (in short steal).
but more than that they tar every other detectorist with the same brush.
there is an army of "archies" out there who would love nothing more than to make metal detecting illegal in this country.
frankly i hope they get all that is coming to them,I hope they get named and shamed and i also hope,for once, that the PAS and various FLO's come forward and admit these thiefs are a small minority amongst our hobby.
there thats me done soap box now put away in shed!

Totally agree Zorro. Would like to know the whole story though. The whole idea of pillaging a site is beyond me and to give us respectable detectorists the same name as them is the bit that hurts.  :( :(

Paul, what i've read of the story is that these guys were on land they had no permission to be on , in the late evening/night time. if those 2 facts are true then that says it all really.

in my eyes the police are having a laugh when they do get caught they either get a ticking off or as i read not to long ago a nightharker was caught in the acted and he go find £38 thats not enough to stop them they can earn five times that in one night ???

I agree with you zorro witch ever way you look at it these persons
where in the wrong, as theres no need to be out detecting at any time of night,
       detecting is a day time hobby so when caught they should have the book thrown at them
              DES

Just read another report and it says the incident took place at 11:45 at night.

if we can find out these peoples  why can't FID and the NCMD send a photo and thier names to every club,and also ban them from every rally,and prove we don't want these people associated with us.viv

It's not very good publicity for us but at least they have been caught, maybe they should also be named & shamed throughout the detecting community!

It's people like this that not only give us a bad name but also make it harder for us to get search "permission".