{"id":642747,"date":"2026-10-27T11:40:12","date_gmt":"2026-10-27T11:40:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/642747\/"},"modified":"2026-10-27T11:40:12","modified_gmt":"2026-10-27T11:40:12","slug":"stolen-garden-ornaments-left-in-gnome-mans-land","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/642747\/","title":{"rendered":"Stolen garden ornaments left in gnome man’s land"},"content":{"rendered":"

Over the course of this year, some Wairarapa homeowners have been the target of a very peculiar type of crime \u2013 the theft of garden gnomes.<\/p>\n

During a search warrant being carried out earlier this month, police found more than 200 stolen garden ornaments, including about 30 garden gnomes.<\/p>\n

Recognise these guys? The curious case the gnome crime spree – Watch on TVNZ+<\/a><\/p>\n

Wairarapa police are having trouble finding out where they live. \u00a0 (Source: 1News)<\/p>\n

One woman has been arrested and charged in relation to the thefts and is set to appear in court next month.<\/p>\n

Sergeant Nick Bunny said it was time for the items to be “gnome-ward bound”, but finding out where they belonged had proven difficult.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019ve asked the gnomes where they reside, but so far, they\u2019ve remained stone-faced,\u201d Bunny said.<\/p>\n

\"Wairarapa<\/p>\n

Wairarapa police with garden gnomes, believed to have been stolen (Source: 1News)<\/p>\n

The haul also included bird baths, outdoor furniture, a gazebo, trollies, windmills, solar lights, children\u2019s wheelbarrows, metal birds, pot plants, statues, sculptures, a concrete giraffe and even a few buddha.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019d really like people to check their gardens and outdoor areas and, if they are missing anything, they should pop into the station with their identification, and we\u2019ll work with them to identify items,\u201d Bunny said. \u201cWe\u2019re hoping the public can help us get them gnome-sweet-gnome,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

The public could also make a report online at 105.police.govt.nz, clicking update report, or by calling 105 and use the reference number 261014\/0880.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Over the course of this year, some Wairarapa homeowners have been the target of a very peculiar type…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":642748,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[67,42,43,40,38,41,39,52],"class_list":["post-642747","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-headlines","tag-crime-and-justice","tag-headlines","tag-news","tag-top-news","tag-top-stories","tag-topnews","tag-topstories","tag-wellington"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/642747","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=642747"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/642747\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/642748"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=642747"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=642747"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=642747"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}