Horrified hospice shop staff arrived at work yesterday morning (July 15) to discover the Park Street premises had been broken into and trashed.
But it was business as usual from 2pm as manager Linda Croke declared: “We’re not going to let this get us down or stop us raising vital funds to keep our adult and children’s services running.”
Hospice spokeswoman Andie Hill said: “Thieves smashed through the back door some time between the shop closing at 5pm on Monday and re-opening yesterday morning at 8.30am.
“They basically trashed the place. They smashed clocks and threw everything about.
“They took money from the collection boxes near the till but there wasn’t much in there.
“The safe wasn’t touched so I don’t think they were high level criminals, just opportunists.
“How can anyone do something like this, especially in Park Street which is one of our key shops in the community? “There’s always a stream of customers either buying something or giving us donations.” She added: “Since the break-in, we’ve had lots of people stopping and offering their support. In fact someone said we should have put out a collection bucket.”
> A police spokesman asked anyone who may have seen or heard anything to ring them on 101.