Pensioner guilty of stealing terracotta warrior statue

Magistrate Derek Lee found Grahame John Geatches guilty after a hearing in Belmont Local Court on Friday.

Mr Geatches, of Charles Street, Swansea, represented himself and pleaded not guilty.

“All I can say is I never done it,” Mr Geatches told the court.

The statue was stolen from outside Belinda’s Gifts and Health Centre in Swansea Arcade.

CCTV footage in the arcade captured an offender using two trolleys to steal the statue, the court heard.

The offender deliberately obscured his face from the camera with a hat.

“There’s no way in a million years that’s me,” Mr Geatches said.

The police prosecution argued that Mr Geatches had similarities to the man in the footage, such as dirty feet, a golden bracelet and the same gait.

“If you compare the way he walks, it’s entirely consistent with a man hunching over,” the prosecutor, Sergeant Williams, who declined to give her first name, said.

Mr Lee said it was a circumstantial case, adding that a lot of people had dirty feet and wore bracelets.

He said the strongest part of the police case was that the two trolleys used in the heist were similar to ones found in Mr Geatches’ backyard, three blocks from the shop.

While the “blue removalist trolley” was common, the “silver-framed trolley” was unusual, Mr Lee said.

Mr Geatches admitted to the court that he had not lent his trolleys to anyone on the day of the theft.

Mr Lee said there was “no direct evidence’’ that he stole the statue.

“No one saw you do it,” he said.

But he said the trolleys found in Mr Geatches’ backyard left him satisfied beyond reasonable doubt of his guilt.

He did not convict Mr Geatches, but placed him on a 12-month good behaviour bond and ordered him to pay compensation for the statue, which had not been recovered.

Owners of the shop, Belinda Wang and Steve Errol, wanted the statue returned, particularly because of its sentimental value.

Mr Geatches had no criminal record, which led magistrate Lee to state that “there must be something else behind the crime” that he was unaware of.

The prosecution said during the hearing that Mr Geatches had other statues in his yard.

‘‘You like statues, don’t you?’’ Sergeant Williams asked Mr Geatches, to which he replied ‘‘Yeah’’.