By LACHLAN MOORHEAD
A PROFESSIONAL Hallam pigeon racer who had more than $10,000 worth of his treasured birds stolen last week has described the brazen theft as a “real kick in the guts”.
More than 30 prized pigeons worth between $100 and $2500 each were stolen from Brett ‘The Birdman’ Evans’ Albert Road property over two nights last Wednesday 2 and Thursday 3 July, while he and his family were asleep.
“It’s a bugger mate, it’s a real kick in the guts and a violation of our rights, really,” Mr Evans said.
Mr Evans, a long-time pigeon breeder who also played 28 AFL games for Richmond in the late ’90s, said the thieves stole eight of his birds from their caged quarters on the first night and had tampered with the lock in preparation for a follow-up job.
“The first night they sort of manipulated the lock up around the latch and they couldn’t access the other cages but then they come back with their tools,” he said.
“We didn’t hear a thing. The dog was yelping a little bit but we just thought they were fighting over the kennel.”
Mr Evans said on the second night the thieves went as far as locking up his two dogs, a Boxer and Jack Russell, to buy themselves more time and also took off with several of his tools and pigeon baskets.
“It’s real brazen and cocky of them,” he said.
“Someone’s going to get hurt, me or them, if I disturb them one night they could have knife or anything – they don’t want to get caught.”
He said half a dozen pigeons had also been stolen in January.
One of the birds taken last week is a special rare pigeon known as a limerick tumbler yellow that Mr Evans imported from Ireland roughly 10 years ago, and can be worth up to $2500.
Mr Evans said he had spent the last week rigging his property with four motion sensors, two alarms, four sensor lights, heavy duty locks and CCTV cameras.
Casey Crime Investigation Unit Detective Senior Constable Simon Watts said there would have had to have been more than one person involved in the theft.
“You would need at least two people to catch and remove that amount of birds,” he said.
“We believe it would have taken up to an hour, maybe even more, to catch and cage them all.
“The birds must be caged somewhere, otherwise they would have flown home.
“They were all tagged, but they have probably been cut off.”
Anyone with information is urged to contact Crime Stoppers on 1800 333 000.
