New helicopter camera finds suspects in Wiltshire (From The Wiltshire Gazette and Herald)

New helicopter camera finds suspects in Wiltshire

10:24am Monday 4th January 2010 in News By Rachel Allen

State of the art camera equipment just installed on the Wiltshire Police helicopter was put to good use during New Year as it managed to track down offenders in two separate incidents.

The helicopter crew was called out to Aldeburgh Place in Trowbridge on New Year's Day at 11.45pm where three offenders had forced entry to a house and threatened the people inside demanding their money and mobile phones.

The crew managed to locate heat sources on an adjacent road, who turned out to be two of the offenders of and they were immediately arrested by ground units.

The helicopter also attended reports of a vehicle failing to stop in Trowbridge on Sunday at 8.35pm after ground units lost sight of the vehicle but found it abandoned soon afterwards in Bleet, near Steeple Ashton.

The suspect then made off across farmland and hid in a deep ditch covered by vegetation but using the helicopter's thermal imaging camera the crew managed to locate him and he was arrested.