{"id":534801,"date":"2026-07-20T07:43:09","date_gmt":"2026-07-20T07:43:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/534801\/"},"modified":"2026-07-20T07:43:09","modified_gmt":"2026-07-20T07:43:09","slug":"man-charged-after-wwi-and-wwii-plaques-in-whakatane-stolen-twice","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/534801\/","title":{"rendered":"Man charged after WWI and WWII plaques in Whakat\u0101ne stolen twice"},"content":{"rendered":"<p class=\"body-paragraph articleLinkText  [&amp;_p]:tit-sub-xl tit-sub-xl md:[&amp;_p]:d-tit-sub-xl md:d-tit-sub-xl mb-[1.3rem]\">A man has been arrested and charged after three World War I and World War II memorial brass plaques in Whakat\u0101ne were stolen, recovered, reinstated and then stolen a second time.<\/p>\n<p class=\"body-paragraph articleLinkText  lg mb-4\">Police had since recovered the plaques but said they had been &#8220;significantly damaged&#8221;.<\/p>\n<p class=\"body-paragraph articleLinkText  lg mb-4\">Senior Sergeant Anthony Hay said the plaques were first stolen from Mitchell Park in March.<\/p>\n<p class=\"body-paragraph articleLinkText  lg mb-4\">&#8220;The plaques were recovered and returned to their rightful place. However, they were stolen again between April and May.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p class=\"body-paragraph articleLinkText  lg mb-4\">Police have recovered the plaques once more with the help of the community.<\/p>\n<p class=\"body-paragraph articleLinkText  lg mb-4\">Hay said the plaques had a &#8220;significant historical and community value&#8221;.<\/p>\n<p class=\"body-paragraph articleLinkText  lg mb-4\">&#8220;It is sad to see them treated in such a disrespectful way given the profound meaning they hold for so many of us in our community.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p class=\"body-paragraph articleLinkText  lg mb-4\">Metal theft was a recurring issue across the Eastern Bay of Plenty, Hay said.<\/p>\n<p class=\"body-paragraph articleLinkText  lg mb-4\">&#8220;We work closely with second-hand metal dealers to identify stolen items and monitor suspicious activity, but we also rely on information from the public.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p class=\"body-paragraph articleLinkText  lg mb-4\">A 52-year-old man has been charged with theft and receiving and was scheduled to appear in Whakat\u0101ne District Court next month.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A man has been arrested and charged after three World War I and World War II memorial brass&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":534802,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[67,111,43,139,69,1756],"class_list":["post-534801","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-new-zealand","tag-crime-and-justice","tag-new-zealand","tag-news","tag-newzealand","tag-nz","tag-tauranga-bay-of-plenty"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/534801","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=534801"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/534801\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/534802"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=534801"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=534801"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=534801"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}