Staff reporters
A male has been charged and a second person interviewed over vandalism to the Thistles Soccer Club playing field in Lismore, which suffered more than $12,000 worth of damage earlier this month.
It was the third time in 18 months the ground had been vandalised, but this time police appear to have got to the bottom of it.
Two youths or young men were caught on the club’s security camera on July 6 doing donuts in a vehicle, which was also deliberately driven into goal posts, according the club president, Paul Albertini.
He told APN Media at the time that the act was ‘clearly premeditated’ given that the culprits had to move a boulder deliberately placed to block vehicular access to the playing field.
Police say a local male was interviewed and charged at Lismore police station on Tuesday and that they have identified and expect to charge a second male.
Lismore is not the only north coast town to have suffered vandalism of its soccer fields in recent weeks.
On the weekend of July 13-14 a couple of hoons churned up the football field in Murwillumbah.
According to local Murwillumbah blogger Madeleine Doherty, the suspects in that case were identified by local people and given the opportunity to come forward before police were drawn into the matter.
The case was made all the worse, Ms Doherty wrote, because the site contained a memorial to former team member Sam Zietlow, who drowned while surfing in December 2011.
