A specialist tricycle stolen from a blind teenager has been found vandalised beyond repair.

The Telegraph & Argus reported last Saturday how Jamie Dee Lowbridge's family had appealed for the tricycle's return after it was taken from the garden of their home in Harbour Road, Wibsey, Bradford.

On learning her tricycle had been smashed up, a tearful Jamie Dee, 17, who suffers from optic nerve dysplasia and is registered blind, said: "It's just gutting, isn't it."

Her father Andrew Myers recovered the tricycle after it was found by a passerby.

Two of the three wheels had been damaged and the frame had been broken.

Mr Myers said: "It has been completely vandalised. I don't know how they've done it but the frame has been snapped."

The tricycle will cost up to £1,000 to replace.

Tom Walton, of Woodside, who found the tricycle on Saturday on waste ground off Moresby Road, said it was in a relatively undamaged condition when he reported it to the police.

When he went back on Sunday to see if it had been taken away, he found it been vandalised. He said: "When I phoned the police I asked if I could do anything to help, but they said leave it with us. I wish I'd have put it the back of my truck."

A police spokesman said: "We are looking into the circumstances of this man's call to see if there has been any breakdown in communication.

"The recovery of stolen property is of paramount importance to the police, but we have to prioritise the calls we receive.

"On a busy Saturday night we would not have been able to respond immediately to a report of this nature.

"We usually advise callers who find property that may have been lost or stolen to bring it in to their nearest police station. If that is not possible, we ask them to keep hold of the item and arrange to collect it from them.

"We understand the distress the theft and subsequent damage of the bike will have caused to this family."

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