A FATHER and son have admitted stealing a length of angle iron which they wanted to make into a tow bar.

Andrew Scarrott, aged 46, of Blackmore Park, Hanley Swan, near Upton-upon-Severn, and his son, also called Andrew Scarrott, 28, of Horbridge Avenue, Badsey, both admitted theft when they appeared before magistrates in Worcester on Tuesday.

The court was told how the men took the metal of unknown value from GL Hearn Holdings Ltd, Blackmore Park Industrial Estate, Malvern, at about 8.45am on November 13. Owen Beale, prosecuting, said: “The estate is derelict and disused and it’s in the hands of receivers. They have suffered a great deal of thefts. At the time of this theft they had instructed a company to fence off the area to prevent further thefts.”

Officers were called to the site and found the men, who had brought a van with them, carrying the metal beam and they were arrested.

Mark Sheward, defending, said: “It’s essentially a site which has been used for fly-tipping for a number of years. Mr Scarrott senior wanted to build a tow bar for his van and needed some metal to do that. The site is open. It’s not fenced off.

“They realise it was not their property to take even though it was on a site where people regularly abandon all sorts of property.

This is clearly not something they thought was an offence or they would have gone in the dead of night, not in the morning when the road was busy with passing traffic.”

Both men were given a 12- month conditional discharge, ordered to pay £85 costs each and a £15 victim surcharge.