IT is going to be a costly Christmas and New Year for two cable thieves who targeted a railway work site near Swindon.

Chad Morgan, 30, and his friend Jonathan Brogden, 31, from Merthyr Tydfil have been ordered to pay £3,000 in compensation to a firm they stole £4,500 worth of cabling from.

The pair were also handed a 10-month prison sentence each, suspended for two years, at Swindon Crown Court.

The pair were caught after detectives from Cardiff and Bristol worked together to solve a theft from a railway work site in Hullavington.

On December 9, 2014, a railway supervisor working on a signalling project in the area arrived on site to find 250m of cabling had been stolen.

Officers from BTP Bristol attended and thoroughly searched the location, finding some of the cable hidden under leaves in nearby woods.

Tracing a path from the cable to an access gate, officers found Brogden’s glove which was sent off for forensic tests.

Later that evening, other Bristol officers uncovered a key witness in the form of a railway worker who had spotted a van in the area the previous night.

The worker had spoken to one of the men with the van, who was in orange hi-vis clothing usually worn by rail workers.

He said he was working further down the line, but the witness became suspicious when the van left only to appear a short time later near the access gate.

Taking down the van’s registration, it was passed onto detectives who quickly identified the vehicle as Chad Morgan’s work van.

Further enquiries, including analysis of road camera footage, showed Morgan - a freelance railway contractor who was not working on the Hullavington site – travelling from Wales to Wiltshire and back again on the day of the offence.

He was arrested in March 2015 and examination of his phone records showed he was communicating with Brogden, another contractor, on the same day.

Along with the DNA on the glove, officers had enough evidence to bring Brogden in for questioning.

Phone data from both men’s phones indicated they were in the area of the theft when it happened and they were subsequently charged with the offence.

Morgan, of Gurnos Road, and Brogden, of Amelia Close, initially denied any involvement in the crime but pleaded guilty on November 6 to one count of cable theft each at Swindon Crown Court.

At their sentencing on Friday, December 11, in addition to their compensation and suspended sentences, Morgan was given a 12-month supervision order and 200 hours of community service, while Brogden was given a six-month curfew on tag.

Sergeant Dave Morris, of BTP’s Proactive CID team, said: "Neither Morgan or Brogden were working on the site in Hullavington but, due to their roles as freelance rail workers, they would have been aware of jobs going on in other areas at the time.

"The vast majority of railway workers are honest, hardworking and seek to help - rather than hinder - the projects underway across the country, keeping us all on the move.

"Unfortunately, as with any industry, there is also a small minority who are in it for their own gain at the cost of others around them.

"Morgan and Brogden are two such individuals and we hope this case sends a clear message to others like them that crime really doesn’t pay.

"They now face a very costly Christmas and start to 2016 and we hope their community service and curfew give them the chance to reflect on their crime and hopefully turn over a new leaf.”