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Father and son deny Bronze Age theft
A father and son team armed with metal detectors illegally removed 3,000-year-old artefacts from an Uttlesford estate while acting as “nighthawkers”, a court was told yesterday (Wednesday, October 28). Land by the M11 yielded Bronze Age axe heads, spearheads and a chisel when the two men were operating there at around 5am in the “dark and rain”, Ipswich Crown Court heard. Paul Hitchens, 57, of Cedar Close, Brentwood, and son Paul Anthony Hitchens, 35, of High Cross Villas, High Cross Lane, Little Canfield, deny theft of artefacts belonging to the Crown. Prosecutor Richard Wood told the court that the two defendants were found on the land at about 5.15am about a mile from the village of Littlebury. He said that at the time it was dark and raining and a police officer spotted the pair “by chance”. Mr Wood continued: “They accepted they had been metal-detecting and accepted they didn’t have permission from the landowner. Searching their vehicle, the police officer found a number of Bronze Age artefacts.” Mr Wood said that the two men had been “caught in the act of stealing” even though they had said they were going to hand the items over to the proper authorities. He added: “The Crown says they were going to keep them for themselves.” He explained a process exists whereby finders report discoveries to a coroner to decide whether they were “treasure”. However, he added, there was a problem of “nighthawking” where people “go out in the middle of the night using metal detectors intending to keep what they find". “The Crown says they were doing that,” he told the court. He continued: “It was a remote, rural area, 5.30am, dark, raining – they didn’t have permission to be there and they didn’t volunteer the items were in the car. They gave inconsistent accounts. “It was not any old field – in the recent past archaeological teams made significant discoveries of Bronze Age items. “It is an important case against nighthawkers who behave in this way – depriving the nation of classical heritage and finding out how we lived 2,000-3,000 years ago.” Source: Herls and Essex Observer >>> Discuss (0 comments) <<< Back to news portal |
