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Baby statue is returned

Tom Rowley
1/ 8/2007

A STATUE stolen from a garden, which was once on a baby's grave, has been returned to its grateful owner - following an article in The Advertiser.

Security guard Ryan Handley was patrolling on Ashton market place outside the town hall when a man rushed up to him and handed him the two feet high statue of a little girl.

Ryan, 26, then carried the heavy greystone statue to The Advertiser office on Booth Street in the town.

He said: "He handed it to me and then got away very fast. He must have read about it in The Advertiser and felt he had to try and get it back to the owner.

"He must have seen my uniform and thought, 'I should hand it in to him'."

Ryan popped in to see the statue restored to its rightful place in the garden of Sandra Lewis's home on Taunton Road in Ashton.

It used to be on her daughter Catherine's grave on Hurst Cross Cemetery in Ashton, for a dozen years or so.

Then Sandra replaced it with a headstone last summer and put the statue in pride of place in her back garden.

For years she could not afford a headstone for Catherine, who died aged six months, from Edward's Syndrome, a rare condition which leads to abnormalities in the heart and other organs.

Sandra said: "I thought if I get something in The Advertiser it might prick the conscience of the thieves a bit for stealing it.

"I'm delighted I've got it back. Now I'll have to think about nailing it down!"