Dozens of Christmas trees worth up to £4,000 stolen from pub garden in north London

Up to £4,000 worth of Christmas trees were stolen from a site operated by Joe Paley and his family Credit: Joe Paley
Ted Hennessey18 December 2019
WEST END FINAL

Get our award-winning daily news email featuring exclusive stories, opinion and expert analysis

I would like to be emailed about offers, event and updates from Evening Standard. Read our privacy notice.

Thieves stole Christmas trees worth up to £4,000 from a vendor to the stars in Highgate.

Around 30 Nordmann fir trees, between seven and 10-foot tall, were stolen from The Woodman pub garden on December 4.

Staff at Christmas Trees at The Woodman discovered the garden’s back gate open and an empty space where the trees stood.

Joe Paley and his family have operated at the site for nine years. They say they have sold trees to stars including singer Louis Tomlinson.

Mr Paley, 29, from Hampstead, said: “When I saw they were missing my first reaction was, ‘What do we do?’ I felt helpless, we’re only a small business. This had a big impact, we’ve lost around £4,000. There was no CCTV either, so it just feels like they’ve got away with doing it.”

Cameras have been installed at the pub to cover the outside area since the theft and barbed wire has been put up.

A Scotland Yard spokesman said: “The trees are believed to have been stolen between 9.30pm on December 4 and 1pm on December 5.”

Create a FREE account to continue reading

eros

Registration is a free and easy way to support our journalism.

Join our community where you can: comment on stories; sign up to newsletters; enter competitions and access content on our app.

Your email address

Must be at least 6 characters, include an upper and lower case character and a number

You must be at least 18 years old to create an account

* Required fields

Already have an account? SIGN IN

By clicking Sign up you confirm that your data has been entered correctly and you have read and agree to our Terms of use , Cookie policy and Privacy notice .

This site is protected by reCAPTCHA and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply.

Thank you for registering

Please refresh the page or navigate to another page on the site to be automatically logged in