In a quiet and picturesque village in Tasmania’s Midlands, a bizarre and brazen robbery has taken place.<\/p>\n
A renowned trophy has been stolen from the Tasmanian Wool Centre in Ross in a late-night smash and grab caught on CCTV.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
The robbery was caught on the centre’s CCTV cameras.\u00a0 (Supplied: Tasmanian Wool Centre)<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
The theft happened close to midnight. (Supplied: Tasmanian Wool Centre)<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
The thief left with the trophy and its wooden case after being unable to remove the trophy from the case. (Supplied: Tasmanian Wool Centre)<\/p>\n
The prestigious Ermenegildo Zegna Trophy was the only item taken from the centre, which houses a museum and gift shop, and is a popular stop for tourists along the Midland Highway.<\/p>\n
The theft is the talk of the village.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
The prestigious Ermenegildo Zegna was on display in the Tasmanian Wool Centre at Ross before it was stolen. (Supplied: Tasmanian Wool Centre)<\/p>\n
The centre’s general manager, Jessica Newton, recalls getting a “terrible” phone call about the robbery one night in December.<\/p>\n
“I couldn’t believe it,” she said.<\/p>\n
“I kept thinking \u2026 did that really happen? Was it a dream, or nightmare?”<\/p>\n
Tasmanian Wool Centre manager Jessica Newton is shocked by the trophy’s theft.\u00a0 (ABC News: Hayden Smith)<\/p>\n
For decades, the “Zegna” trophy has represented the strong ties between premium Tasmanian wool and Italian high fashion.<\/p>\n
From 1963 to 2008, it was awarded to the best superfine merino fleece, and considered among the world’s most coveted wool industry trophies.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
The Ermenegildo Zegna Perpetual Trophy was presented to the best Superfine wool grower from 1963 until 2008. (Supplied: Tasmanian Wool Centre)<\/p>\n
Ms Newton described the trophy \u2014 created by renowned Tasmanian sculptor Stephen Walker \u2014 as “spectacular”.<\/p>\n
“It’s an amazing thing to see,” she said.<\/p>\n
“It tells the story of wool growing in the Midlands.”<\/p>\n
In recent years, it had been showcased at the centre’s museum.<\/p>\n
But that all changed at 11:38pm on Friday, December 5.<\/p>\n
Nothing else stolen in heist caught on CCTV<\/p>\n
CCTV footage shows a man breaking into the museum’s side door and heading straight for the Zegna.<\/p>\n
Clad in a hoodie, trousers and gloves, he then uses a hammer to smash through the glass casing, before taking the trophy and fleeing the scene in a white van.<\/p>\n
The robbery was over in a matter of minutes.<\/p>\n
No-one has been arrested and Tasmania Police say investigations are ongoing.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
The Tasmanian Wool Centre was founded in 1988.<\/p>\n
\u00a0 (ABC News: Hayden Smith)<\/p>\n
While baffled by the brazen heist, Ms Newton believed the trophy was specifically targeted.<\/p>\n
“It’s made out of some beautiful things, but not a huge amount of them,” she said.<\/p>\n
“To go to this trouble to take it \u2026 it’s a mystery.”Will ‘priceless’ trophy be returned?<\/p>\n
For those in the Tasmanian wool industry, like broker Rob Calvert, the trophy’s theft has been a shock.<\/p>\n
“We’re very sad that this has happened and hopefully it turns up again,” he said.<\/p>\n
“The growers that won the award were regarded as producing the finest wool in the world.”<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
Wool broker Rob Calvert says the trophy’s value is symbolic, rather than commercial. (ABC News: Hayden Smith)<\/p>\n
Premium Tasmanian wool continues to be popular among Italian luxury fashion brands, including Milan-based Zegna.<\/p>\n
“It means a lot more to the industry and to Tasmania \u2014 and to those few farmers who were lucky enough to win it \u2014 than it does from a commercial point of view,” Mr Calvert said.<\/p>\n
More than a month after the incident, Ms Newton said locals were still talking about it.<\/p>\n
“We’ve never been involved in any sort of robberies or anything like that,” she said.<\/p>\n
“The town is a really beautiful, small, tight-knit community.”<\/p>\n
Still, she was hopeful the Zegna would one day be returned.<\/p>\n
“First and foremost, it would be amazing to get it back,” she said.<\/p>\n
“It’s priceless, and it’s not the type of thing you can just sell down at the pub or offload easily.”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"In a quiet and picturesque village in Tasmania’s Midlands, a bizarre and brazen robbery has taken place. A…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":406744,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[98710,43,44,45388,8539,2801,41,39,42,40,114692,31221,215546],"class_list":["post-406743","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-headlines","tag-centre","tag-headlines","tag-news","tag-robbery","tag-tas","tag-tasmania","tag-top-news","tag-top-stories","tag-topnews","tag-topstories","tag-trophy","tag-wool","tag-zegna"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/406743","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=406743"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/406743\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/406744"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=406743"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=406743"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=406743"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}