By LACHLAN MOORHEAD
THE owner of a severed finger found in a Hallam ute has come forward to police.
The man aged in his thirties contacted police last Thursday morning and appeared to be in “good spirits”, a police spokeswoman said.
“The incident appears to be the result of misadventure,” she said.
“No offence has occurred.”
It comes after Andrew Manson from Berwick discovered the top of the finger – with fingernail – under the side lip of his ute’s tray about 9am on Monday.
Mr Manson, the manager of American Republic Wheels in Hallam, where the gruesome discovery was made, said the fingertip must have found its way into the back of the ute over the weekend while it was parked outside his home.
“There’s no doubt while it was parked in Berwick over the weekend that something happened,” he said.
“I don’t know what happened.
“I was driving it but it was parked there (Berwick) the whole weekend, and on Friday we cleaned it so we know it wasn’t there then and then it’s been there over the weekend.
“Someone must have just jumped in the back or something.”
Mr Manson said his wife had first noticed what the couple thought was rust on Sunday, but he didn’t realise it was a finger until Monday once he had driven the car back to his Hallam garage.
“Monday morning we’d gone to clean it out when it’s here (Hallam), we cleaned the rust off it, mud – we didn’t really know it was – and we noticed then it was a little thing shoved up under the back of the tail rack,” he said.
