A COUPLE were devastated when they arrived at their car business to find it ransacked and stripped of tools worth up to £70,000.

The heartless thieves who raided Court Farm Garage car sales and servicing in Littledean overnight on Wednesday to Thursday (October 30 to 31) last week even took the mini-motorbike of the mechanic’s eight-year-old son, which he had brought in to work on.

Business owners Jenny and Grant Hughes, who have run the garage for 15 years, say they face having to start again from scratch after everything from specialist diagnostic tools to cleaning cloths were cleaned out by the burglars.

A heavy safe, which was empty and needs three people to lift it, was also removed, but was later found dumped at the roadside seven miles away in Parkend.

The gang cut phone lines, poured hard-setting foam into the alarms and disabled the CCTV before smashing their way into the garage’s Broad Street CDT Auto workshop, ripping off doors and other fittings in their hunt for valuables.

Jenny said after discovering the scene of devastation on Thursday morning: “They have trashed the place. They have broken through doors and ripped off interior doors.

“The place is upside down. They have taken specialist tools which our technicians have spent all their lives saving up and working to get and we have had diagnostic equipment which has been taken.

“Everything from dash-cams even down to silly cleaning cloths has gone.

“I don’t think they have picked on us personally, but we are right on the main road and we have a thousand cars an hour going past.

“I think the suggestions are that it is an organised break-in and they’ve taken equipment worth between £60,000 and £70,000.”

Jenny added: “We left the site at 6pm on Wednesday and we returned at 8am, and found it had happened. The stolen mini-motorbike is our mechanic’s son’s and he has only had it a little while.

“You can understand people taking tools they can sell on quickly, but when you take something which belongs to a child, it is terrible.

In the wake of the break-in, Court Farm Garage faced a struggle to get work on customers’ cars completed and faced the prospect of having to pay employees with little to no cash coming in.

But the local community has rallied around in support, and have leant some tools to keep working and other support.

“The locals have been amazing,” said Jenny.

“We have people turning up and bringing sarnies. We have even had a local mechanic coming down and saying we can use his tools.

“We want to thank everyone for their help,” she said.

A Gloucestershire Police spokesperson said: “We are investigating a burglary and criminal damage at two adjoining properties in Littledean and criminal damage at a third following an incident which was reported this morning, Thursday, October 31.

“Offenders have forced their way into Court Farm  Garage, in Broad Street, overnight and after damaging phone lines, external alarms and CCTV cables have stolen a selection of tools.

“From there they have forced their way through an internal door into CDT Auto where they caused more damage and stole tools and a safe.

“CCTV cables to a hairdressing business have also been cut.

“Anyone with infor- mation about the in-cident is asked to call Gloucestershire Police on 101 quoting incident 74 of 31 October.”